Juan de Flandes and His Financial Success in Castile - Journal of Historians of Netherlandish Art

During the late fifteenth century, the Netherlandish painter Juan de Flandes traveled to the court of Isabel, queen of Castile and León. He remained in her service until her death and subsequently secured multiple commissions for contributions to large-scale altarpiece projects. The financial documents associated with his career and his works reveal a high level of economic success in comparison to other artists active in Castile, including his fellow court painter Michel Sittow. This investigation into the fiscal opportunities available to a Netherlandish émigré demonstrates the economic power of locally produced Flemish art in sixteenth-century Iberia.

DOI: 10.5092/jhna.2019.11.1.2

The Netherlandish painter Juan de Flandes (active 1496–1519) had a lucrative career on the Iberian Peninsula, and his professional history serves as an important case study on the economic motivations for immigrant artists.¹ He first appears in 1496 in the court documents of Isabel, queen of Castile and León (1451–1504), and he used his northern European artistic training to satisfy the queen’s demand for Netherlandish-style panel paintings. He was elevated to the position of pintor de corte (court painter) and maintained this rank until the queen’s death. His production during these years included royal portraits (fig. 1) and small devotional paintings, such as the panels associated with the Retablo de Isabel (fig. 2).² As court painter, Juan de Flandes traversed the Iberian Peninsula from Burgos in the north to Seville in the south, migrating between site-specific patronage projects, the current installation of the queen’s court, and other royal holdings.³ Although there is no surviving documentation that indicates Juan de Flandes accepted outside commissions during his service to the crown, these travels would have enabled contact between the painter and a wide variety of prominent courtiers and local artists. After Isabel’s death, Juan appears to have utilized this network of courtly connections to successfully compete for high profile commissions. By cultivating a desire for his paintings among supporters of the crown, Juan was able to capitalize on his previous association with the monarchy. This marketing strategy allowed the Flemish painter to further advance his career and economic potential.

Fig. 1 Juan de Flandes, Isabel la Católica, ca. 1500–1504., Madrid, Palacio Real

Fig. 1 Juan de Flandes, Isabel la Católica, ca. 1500–1504. Madrid, Palacio Real, inv. 10010174 (artwork in the public domain; photo: Album/Art Resource, N.Y.) [side-by-side viewer]

Fig. 2 Juan de Flandes, The Marriage Feast at Cana, from the Retablo de I, ca. 1500–1504., New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Fig. 2 Juan de Flandes, The Marriage Feast at Cana, from the Retablo de Isabel, ca. 1500–1504. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, inv. 1982.60.20 (artwork in the public domain; photo: Metropolitan Museum of Art, courtesy of Creative Commons Zero [CC0]) [side-by-side viewer]

Juan de Flandes’s financial transactions appear in numerous royal account books, ecclesiastical records, and altarpiece contracts. An additional glimpse into the market value of his paintings is provided by the assessment of monetary value for some of his works within the royal inventories. Cumulatively, these documents create a relatively complete and at times surprisingly nuanced view of his financial success during his career in Spain. The economic analysis of this Netherlandish painter reveals his successful marketability among the Spanish elite, as well as the exceptionally high esteem Juan held among his patrons.

Juan de Flandes, Pintor de Corte

Juan de Flandes’s economic prosperity began his first year in Castile. The cuentas (royal account books) record the payment of 6,000 maravedíes (abbreviated hereafter as mrs.) to Juan de Flandes on July 12, 1496, from the royal treasurer Gonzalo de Baeza.⁴ This sum may have been intended to cover his initial travel expenses.⁵ Only three months later, Isabel authorized the payment of 20,000 mrs. as a recurring annual salary, securing the services of Juan de Flandes for the future year.⁶ On arriving in Castile, he joined a vibrant and extensive royal entourage, where he worked alongside both foreign-born and native artists, including Michel Sittow (1469–1525), Francisco Chacón (active 1480–ca. 1501), Antonio Inglés (documented at the Castilian court between 1489 and 1490), and Pedro Berruguete (ca. 1450–1504).⁷

In December an additional sum of 15,000 mrs. was disbursed for outfitting the Flemish painter with proper clothing as a marker of his official status.⁸ Moreover, Isabel directed Juan de Flandes to create an altarpiece dedicated to John the Baptist (fig. 3) as part of the extensive redecoration of the Carthusian Chapterhouse at Miraflores outside of Burgos.⁹ In its original configuration, the Retablo de San Juan Bautista was composed of five narrative scenes from the life of the saint and would have been installed in a small space on axis with the main liturgical space.¹⁰ The production costs for this altarpiece were shared between the crown and the institution. The monastic account books record the housing and feeding of the painter at the cost of 26,735 mrs.¹¹ When the three royal disbursements are considered alongside the monastic expenditures, Juan de Flandes received various forms of compensation valued over 67,000 mrs. during his first six months of employment in Castile (table 1).

Juan de Flandes, The Baptism of Christ, central panel from the Ret, ca. 1500., Madrid, private collection — Fig. 3 Juan de Flandes, *The Baptism of Christ,* central panel from the *Retablo de San Juan Bautista,* ca. 1500. Madrid, private collection (artwork in the public domain; photo: Album/Art Resource, N.Y.) **[side-by-side viewer]**

The fortunes of Juan de Flandes continued to increase when in 1498 he received the official title of pintor de corte.¹² The change in status coincided with an increase of his annual allotment to 30,000 mrs., though it was not put into effect until the following year.¹³ Juan also received a payment of 26,735 mrs. for the Retablo de San Juan Bautista in 1499, signaling the successful completion of this project.¹⁴ Ostensibly due to the success of his paintings, Juan de Flandes began to receive additional monies beyond his regular salary. Although only one payment of 10,000 mrs. appears within the royal account books between 1497 and 1498, this payment is designated as for “certain works completed for Her Highness [Queen Isabel]” and it is probable that it was in excess of his annual salary.¹⁵ A similar payment of 15,000 mrs. occurred on April 6, 1500, as well as 4,000 mrs. in 1501 and 6,000 mrs. in 1502.¹⁶

As the total documented amount received by Juan de Flandes is calculated at over 350,000 mrs. for more than eight years of consistent employment, it is clear that his time spent at Isabel’s court was extremely lucrative (table 1).¹⁷ It should be noted that the artist received additional compensation in the form of living expenses and provisions for the costly materials necessary for the creation of his paintings. As a member of the royal entourage, Juan would have received food and lodging when he traveled alongside his patron. That Isabel secured accommodation for her household members even when they were absent from her court is suggested by the records of the monastery at Miraflores, in which the monies paid to Juan de Flandes are marked as being supplemented by room, board, and the provision of fine pigments intended for the altarpiece.¹⁸ Occasionally, payment was made in kind, as when Antonio Inglés was given eight lengths of fine Holland cloth as payment for portraits made of the royal children.¹⁹

The annual salary of 20,000, and then 30,000 mrs., allotted to Juan de Flandes has often been interpreted as indicating a subservient position to (and lesser esteem than) his fellow court painter Michel Sittow, who had been given a pension of 50,000 mrs. in 1492.²⁰ Joaquín Yarza Luaces even uses the difference in salary, and the coinciding assumption of quality, to question the attribution of the Retablo de San Juan Bautista to Juan de Flandes, stating the “exceptional piece seems difficult to attribute to Juan de Flandes, being closer to Michel Sittow, the great master who arrived in Castile before Juan de Flandes and received a higher fixed annual salary, greater than that of the other.”²¹ Jeltje Dijkstra uses a similar logic to argue that the copy of Rogier van der Weyden’s Miraflores Altarpiece, split between the Capilla Real of Granada and the Metropolitan Museum of New York, must have been created by Sittow.²² Greta Koppel has recently repeated this idea, stating “As Sittow was then working at the court and, based on his high salary, was presumably the queen’s preferred artist, he has been considered the probable author of the copy of such a prestigious work.”²³

However, what is often missing from this assessment based on remuneration is the fact that the crown had immense difficulties making good on its commitment to Sittow.²⁴ While registering a payment of 10,000 mrs. to Sittow in 1495, the royal official included a notation that an amount remained owed due to the shortage of available funds.²⁵ By September of the following year, 214,000 mrs. were needed to discharge the debt.²⁶ Moreover, Sittow neither received an increase to his annual allotment nor regularly received compensation beyond his salary. Only one such payment is known, for 5,000 mrs. in 1499, designated for the purchasing of new clothing.²⁷ Sittow’s compensation remained relatively static over the course of his Castilian career, with the additional monies disbursed in 1498, 1499, and 1500 due to underpayment in preceding years (table 1).

In contrast, Juan de Flandes received a 50 percent raise to his salary after only two years of employment. Moreover, the queen immediately sent Juan to create the Retablo de San Juan Bautista as part of the refurbishment of the Carthusian Chapterhouse of Miraflores, with the production costs shared between the monastery and the crown, resulting in additional income for Juan. Nor was this the only time Juan received monies beyond his salary; he appears to have received additional payments in at least three additional years. The supplementary funds are especially interesting when considered alongside the financial difficulties experienced by the monarchy during these years. The crown had difficulty accessing funds, as evidenced by the difficulty in paying the salary promised to Sittow.²⁸ The crown’s fiscal realities may have also contributed to the change in the payment structure of Juan de Flandes’s salary away from 30,000 mrs. recompensed in one lump sum, as occurred in 1500.²⁹ In the years 1501, 1503, and 1504, Juan’s annual salary was divided into payments of 10,000 mrs. and 20,000 mrs.³⁰ In 1502, the 30,000 mrs. appears to have been divided into three equal parts, with the final third not paid until the following year.³¹

An aggregate view of Juan’s financial compensation further complicates the traditional comparison of this artist with Michael Sittow. Cumulatively, the total documented amount paid to Juan de Flandes during his time at court comes to just over 350,000 mrs. for eight years of employment (see table 1). Although Sittow was employed at the Castilian court for a slightly longer period of time and received a significantly larger annual salary than Juan de Flandes, the total monies disbursed to Sittow only exceeded those to Juan by approximately 7 percent, a much lower difference than the initial 30,000 mrs. to 50,000 mrs. comparison suggests. Therefore, it is difficult to presume that Michael Sittow’s larger annual pension indicates by default that he was held in far greater esteem by the queen or that he produced works of a higher quality.³² Instead, the painters appear to have been placed on a relatively equal financial footing with one another. This new interpretation is supported by their collaboration on artistic projects, such as the Retablo de Isabel, and by the appearance of payments in the royal account books naming both artists as having received monies from the same treasurer on the same day, suggesting that the two painters traveled and worked alongside each other.³³ The amounts paid to both painters far exceeded the 10,112 mrs. paid to Antonio Inglés, though it should be noted that he was not employed as a pintor de corte and maintained his primary affiliation with the English monarchy while in Castile.³⁴ The sums paid to Juan de Flandes were especially high when compared to the wages earned by other Castilian workers.³⁵

The Financial Evaluation of Works Produced for Isabel

Juan de Flandes’s marketability is further indicated by the high monetary value his paintings garnered after Isabel’s death. In preparation for the liquidation of the queen’s estate, a general appraisal was made of her luxury goods. The values of 106 paintings from Isabel’s personal painting collection were recorded, amounting to 464,295.5 mrs. (table 2).³⁶ The estimate included the forty-seven panels of the Retablo de Isabel, forty-three panels of which were sold to three separate purchasers.³⁷ The successful dispersal of the Retablo de Isabel contrasts with the greater liquidation efforts; approximately only a third of Isabel’s paintings were successfully sold.³⁸ The perceived quality of the Retablo de Isabel panels is also suggested by their high value when compared to the estimated values of items in the general collection.³⁹ The individual panels from the project ranged from 937.5 mrs. to 2,250 mrs. (table 3), markedly higher than the collection’s median value of 375 mrs..⁴⁰ With a collective value of 76,875 mrs., the forty-three panels of the Retablo de Isabel constituted 16.5 percent of the total value of the queen’s painting collection. When considered collectively, the Retablo de Isabel was one of the highest valued painted projects, second only to a triptych of the Passion by Dirk Bouts (1415–1475), valued at 282,860 mrs. (table 4).⁴¹ Moreover, a comparison between the monies collected from the sale of the Retablo de Isabel and the funds disbursed to Juan de Flandes during his career as court painter reveals that if all of the paintings had been sold at their original estimated value the crown would have been able to recoup nearly a quarter of the funds originally disbursed to Juan de Flandes and offset approximately two years of average salary.⁴² This suggests that even though Juan de Flandes was paid a substantial amount, the value of the works produced would have had the potential to offset a considerable portion of the costs if they were liquidated. Not only were his works held in high esteem by the crown, their desirability appears to have extended to the upper nobility, who provided a ready market for the Retablo de Isabel.

Juan de Flandes and the Altarpiece Market

Juan de Flandes was able to capitalize on the demand for locally produced works in the Hispano-Flemish style after Isabel’s death, when he began successfully to compete for lucrative project-specific commissions in northern Castile. On August 29, 1505, he submitted a sample panel painting for consideration in the refurbishment of the Capilla de San Jerónimo, the main chapel of the University of Salamanca.⁴³ Three days later, the governing body of the university contracted Juan to produce images for the retablo mayor of the chapel (fig. 4).⁴⁴ This project was a collaborative effort between several artists. The altarpiece had been initiated sometime before 1503 as a sculptural retablo; later the university began investigating the potential of integrating paintings into the project.⁴⁵ Juan de Flandes’s contract, dated September 2, 1505, stipulates the creation of eight narrative scenes from the life of Saint Jerome in addition to six painted standing figures, with the particular imagery to be specified at a future time.⁴⁶ For these fourteen paintings Juan would receive 85,000 mrs. of compensation. The payments were to be divided into an initial disbursement of 20,000 mrs. at the signing of the contract with the remainder paid upon completion of the panels. Juan de Flandes was also to be given a “fine room” for the duration of his employment with the university.

Juan de Flandes, Saints Michael and Francis, from the altarpiece o, ca. 1505–9., New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art — Fig. 4 Juan de Flandes, *Saints Michael and Francis,* from the altarpiece of the University of Salamanca chapel, ca. 1505–9. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, inv. 58.132 (artwork in the public domain; photo: Metropolitan Museum of Art, courtesy of Creative Commons Zero – CC0) **[side-by-side viewer]**

The contract stated that the work was to be completed in one year to the “contentment of the University and the teachers” under threat of forfeit of any outstanding payment as well as the return of any monies or supplies already dispersed.⁴⁷ In contrast with the stated terms of the contract, Juan received a series of payments as he progressed. For example, on February 1, 1507, a payment of 10,000 mrs. was dispersed to the artist, which was followed by 20,000 mrs. on June 28 of the same year.⁴⁸ The university leaders must have been satisfied with the general progress of the project as they commissioned a banco (predella) (fig. 5) from Juan de Flandes for an additional 15,000 mrs. a few weeks later.⁴⁹ Although the banco was completed within months, Juan did not finish the narrative and figural images until July 4, 1508, almost two years past the time dictated in the original contract.⁵⁰ Because of the amount of time and materials invested in the project as well as improvements made to the original compositions, Juan de Flandes petitioned for an increase in his final payment.⁵¹ The Claustro de la Universidad debated the merits of the work, and within a week the Vicerector and Vicescholástico of the university decided to award an additional 15,000 mrs. to the Flemish painter.⁵² This final payment brings the total monies paid to Juan de Flandes to 115,000 mrs. for his portion of the retablo mayor project.

Juan de Flandes, Saints Apolonia and Mary Magdalen from the altarp, 1507, University of Salamanca — Fig. 5 Juan de Flandes, *Saints Apolonia and Mary Magdalen* from the altarpiece of the University of Salamanca chapel, 1507. University of Salamanca (artwork in the public domain; photo: Wikimedia Commons) **[side-by-side viewer]**

The documentation surrounding the University of Salamanca altarpiece includes neither direct statements regarding Juan de Flandes’s artistic reputation nor a critical assessment of his works. However, the actions of the governing body overseeing the refurbishment of Capilla de San Jerónimo suggest that Juan was able both to impress his patrons and to convince them of the high value of his work.⁵³ The drawing up of a second contract before the successful completion of the first indicates a warm reception for the painter’s progress. The decision by leading members of the governing body to augment the compensation for the narrative and figural images by just over 17 percent indicates Juan’s ability successfully convince them of the additional value of the work due to his long hours of skillful labor. The Claustro de la Universidad further revealed their high regard for Juan de Flandes and their satisfaction with his product by attempting to commission a second altarpiece for the newly constructed Hospital de la Universidad from the “excellent painter” after the completion of the altarpiece for the university chapel.⁵⁴ The context for this discussion, which occurred shortly after the decision to raise Juan’s compensation, indicates their increasing desire for his works. While Juan de Flandes did not accept the commission, he participated in the project as an expert to assess the quality of the final work in advance of payment.⁵⁵ The success of the university altarpiece also resulted in the private commission of the Retablo de San Miguel (fig. 6), a funerary monument for the Salamanca law professor Francisco Rodriguez de San Isidro.⁵⁶

Juan de Flandes, Retablo de San Miguel, 1508/9., Salamanca, Cathedral Museum. — Fig. 6 Juan de Flandes, *Retablo de San Miguel,* 1508/9. Salamanca, Cathedral Museum. (artwork in the public domain; photo: Wikimedia Commons, courtesy of CC BY-SA 3.0 – http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0) **[side-by-side viewer]**

Like the retablo mayor for the university of Salamanca, the second major commission granted to Juan de Flandes after Isabel’s death was also for paintings to accompany an already existing sculpted altarpiece. When Juan Rodriguez de Fonseca (1451–1524) was named bishop of Palencia in 1509, the cathedral was in a state of expansion and refurbishment.⁵⁷ Fonseca decided to reconfigure a recently completed but not yet installed sculpted retablo intended for the Capilla del Sagrario as a retablo mayor for the high altar in the newly renovated choir (fig. 7).⁵⁸ The sculpted altarpiece would have consisted of a series of saints standing in niches separated by pilasters.⁵⁹ The contract with Juan de Flandes describes how, in order to augment the overall scale of the project, the bishop commissioned additional painted images.⁶⁰ The contract specifies the Christological subject matter and relative size of the paintings, suggesting that the integration of the painted components into the structure had already been established.⁶¹ The paintings were to be of high quality by Juan’s own hand.⁶² Interestingly, the document suggests that Bishop Fonseca anticipated the regional stylistic differences between the sculpted and painted elements. The description of the original sculpted retablo as “de talla Romano” mimics the language used in the original commission contract from 1504, which stated that the sculptures were to be done in the “style and manner of the ancients and the Romans.”⁶³ As a member of the royal entourage living in Flanders from 1499 until 1505, Fonseca would have been well aware of the differences between northern and southern European regional styles.⁶⁴ The high regard the bishop held for Juan de Flandes and his Flemish painting style is suggested by the incredibly high price of 187,000 mrs. to be paid for the panels over a period of three years.⁶⁵ The Palencia altarpiece project continued to evolve after Juan completed the paintings—even after the installation in 1527.⁶⁶

Juan de Flandes, Juan Tejerina, Pedro de Guadeloupe, Felipe Bigarny, and Pedro Manso, Retablo Mayor, begun in 1504., Cathedral of Palencia — Fig. 7 Juan de Flandes, Juan Tejerina, Pedro de Guadeloupe, Felipe Bigarny, and Pedro Manso, *Retablo Mayor,* begun in 1504. Cathedral of Palencia (artwork in the public domain; photo: author) **[side-by-side viewer]**

Castilian retablos were site-specific and highly customized ensembles, complicating any attempt to compare the amounts paid to Juan de Flandes with contemporary altarpieces in order to ascertain his position on the Castilian pay-scale.⁶⁷ In addition to the prestige value of a specific painter, the fluctuations in the value of currency, the scale of the retablo, its intended location in the church, the elaborateness of the frame, and the use of expensive materials such as gold, ultimately influenced the final price.⁶⁸ However by comparing the contracts for eight retablos constructed in Castile in the final decades of Isabel’s reign, it is possible to loosely establish the range of prices charged by painters contemporary to Juan de Flandes (table 5). As one might expect, smaller projects such as the chapel retablo for the parish church in Cedala were significantly lower in cost than retablo mayors for important cathedrals, exemplified by the high altarpiece of Toledo.⁶⁹ These smaller projects were also more likely to be completely overseen by the painter, who would be responsible for all the costs of production, impacting the profit margin on the project.⁷⁰ The contract for the retablo in the Luna family chapel in the Toledo cathedral (fig. 8), for example, includes a detailed discussion of the elaborately carved gilt frame, the acquisition of which was presumably the responsibility of Sancho de Zamora and Juan de Segovia.⁷¹ Larger projects with multiple contracts involving several different independent artists, as is the case for the retablo mayor of the Toledo cathedral (fig. 9), provide a view into the relative costs of the paintings and sculptures.⁷² That the sculptor Peti Juan (documented 1497–1504) was paid a higher amount than the painter Juan de Borgoña (1470–1534) for their work in the cathedral provides economic support for the traditional interpretation of sculpture as more expensive and therefore more prestigious than painting.⁷³ In contrast with the case of the retablo mayor of the Toledo cathedral, Juan de Flandes was the highest paid artist involved in both the retablo for the Capilla de San Jerónimo and the retablo mayor of Palencia cathedral. In fact, the paintings by Juan de Flandes significantly increased the overall costs for these altarpieces.

Fig. 8 Sancho de Zamora and Juan de Segovia, Retablo, Luna Family Chapel, 1488, Cathedral of Toledo

Fig. 8 Sancho de Zamora and Juan de Segovia, Retablo, Luna Family Chapel, 1488. Cathedral of Toledo (artwork in the public domain; photo: author) [side-by-side viewer]

Fig. 9 Peti Juan, Maestro Rodrigo, Cop’n de Holanda, Sebasi‡n de Almonacid, Felip Bigarny, and others, Retablo Mayor, 1498–1504., Cathedral of Toledo

Fig. 9 Peti Juan, Maestro Rodrigo, Copín de Holanda, Sebasián de Almonacid, Felip Bigarny, and others, Retablo Mayor, 1498–1504. Cathedral of Toledo (artwork in the public domain; photo: author) [side-by-side viewer]

Understanding Juan de Flandes’s Financial Success

The high prices paid to Juan de Flandes while he was active on the Castilian market reflected the strong desire felt by patrons to secure his services and corresponded to a general craving for Flemish art. The market in which Juan de Flandes’s training and working practices were in such high demand resulted from the preferences of Isabel of Castile for a northern European style.⁷⁴ Isabel modeled the magnificence of her court on the material luxury and splendor of the dukes of Burgundy, including the use of Netherlandish art.⁷⁵ Isabel’s marked preference for northern European luxury goods, including tapestries and paintings, communicated both an international sophistication and a localized, specifically Castilian, identity. The dominance of the taste for Flemish art at Isabel court is indicated by the career of Pedro Berruguete, who even after working in the Italian city of Urbino continued to utilize Hispano-Flemish forms upon his return to Castile, ostensibly in response to the desires of his patrons.⁷⁶ The queen was willing to pay Juan de Flandes and Michel Sittow incredibly large amounts because of her desire for locally produced Flemish paintings that could be tailored to coincide with her specific political and devotional needs.⁷⁷

After Isabel’s death, Juan de Flandres continued to utilize a social network of artists and patrons to obtain lucrative commissions across Castile.⁷⁸ The close connection between the queen and her taste for Flemish art helps explain why the Castilian elite continued to commission artworks from Juan, despite their high price. The ability to work with oil glazes, a technique not well understood by Iberian painters, certainly affected the final price paid for Juan de Flandes’s works in Salamanca and Palencia.⁷⁹ However, neither the cost and quality of materials nor the continued desire for Flemish luxury goods adequately explains the exceedingly high level of financial success achieved by the artist later in his career. The tensions between the nobility and the crown, heightened during the short reign of Philip the Fair and the regency of Charles V (1550–58), augmented the need for those loyal to Isabel’s legacy to communicate their allegiance.⁸⁰ As a former court painter, Juan de Flandes provided a vehicle for courtiers to demonstrate their continued loyalty to and association with the monarchy. The acquisition of artworks once owned by the queen, for example by purchasing panels from the Retablo de Isabel at the sale of the queen’s estate, or the commissioning of altarpiece components from the former court artist perpetuated a direct connection with the deceased queen.⁸¹ Juan de Flandes’s ability to capitalize on the aesthetic and political environment in post-Isabeline Castile allowed the Flemish painter a level of financial success unavailable to many of his Castilian contemporaries. Even as Spanish taste shifted toward the forms of the Italian Renaissance, the exorbitant prices paid to Juan de Flandes in the last decades of his career reveal the continued fervent desire for Flemish painting in the early sixteenth century.

Table 1. Summation of payments made to painters as recorded in royal accounts
Year	Juan de Flandes	Michael Sittow	Antonio Inglés
1489			7,300 mrs.
1490			2,812 mrs.
1494		50,000 mrs.
1495		10,000 mrs.
1496	67,633 mrs.	118,834 mrs.
1497	10,000 mrs.
1498		56,499 mrs.
1499	86,735 mrs.	55,000 mrs.
1500	75,000 mrs.	66,666 mrs.
1501	24,000 mrs.	20,000 mrs.
1502	36,000 mrs.	10,000 mrs.
1503	30,000 mrs.
1504	30,000 mrs.
TOTAL	359,368 mrs.	386,999 mrs.	10,112 mrs.
Average per year of employment	39,929 mrs.	42,999 mrs.	10,112 mrs.

Table 2. Distribution of prices assessed for paintings in the sale of Isabel’s estate
Price Range	Number of Works
1-1,000 mrs.	41
1,000-1,500 mrs.	31
1,501-2,000 mrs.	18
2,001-5,000 mrs.	13
+5,000 mrs.	2
TOTAL VALUE	464,295.5 mrs.

Table 3. Distribution of prices assessed for the panels of the Retablo de Isabel
Value	Number of Panels
937.5 mrs.	1
1,125 mrs.	5
1,312.5 mrs.	3
1,500 mrs.	17
1,687.5 mrs.	2
1,875 mrs.	14
2,250 mrs.	5
TOTAL VALUE	76,875 mrs.

Table 4. Estimated value for paintings in Isabel’s estate, organized by artist
Artist	Number of Works	Total Value
Dirk Bouts	1	282,860 mrs.
Juan de Flandes/Michel Sittow Retablo de Isabel	47	76,875 mrs.
Diego Sanchez and Anton Sanchez de Guadalupe	1	3,000 mrs.
Hieronymus Bosch	2	1,375 mrs.
Anonymous Artists	55	100,373 mrs.
TOTAL	106	464,295.5 mrs.

Table 5. Prices paid for a selection of Castilian retablos in the late fifteenth century
Artist	Title	Location	Price	Division of Monies
Sancho de Zamora (painter)	Chapel Retablo	Cedala	12,000 mrs.	Total price paid to painter, all aspects of production overseen by painter
Bernaldino (painter)	Retablo of St. James	Zorita	53,000 mrs.	Total price paid to painter, all aspects of production overseen by painter
A. Ledesma (painter)	Retablo San Nicolás	Palencia	60,000 mrs.	Total price paid to painter, all aspects of production overseen by painter
Sancho de Zamora (painter) and Juan de Segovia (painter)	Retablo of the Luna Family	Toledo	105,000 mrs.	Total price paid to painter, all aspects of production overseen by painter
Pedro Díaz de Oviedo	Retablo Mayor	Tudela	270,000 mrs.	Total price paid to painter, all aspects of production overseen by painter
Juan de Flandes (painter), Felipe Bigarny (sculptor), Juan Ipres (guilder), and Anton de Lorena (carpenter)	University Chapel Retablo	Salamanca	293,000 mrs.	Multiple contracts with 115,000 mrs. to Juan de Flandes, 38,00 mrs. to Felipe de Bigarny, 100,000 mrs. to Juan Ipres, and 40,000 mrs. to Anton de Lorena.
Juan de Flandes (painter), Juan Tejerina (painter), Pedro de Guadeloupe (sculptor), Felipe Bigarny (sculptor), Pedro Manso (carpenter)	Retablo Mayor	Palencia	535,250 mrs.	Multiple contracts with 187,500 mrs. to Juan de Flandes, 3,750 mrs. to Juan Tejerina, 139,000 mrs. to Pedro de Guadeloupe, 130,000 mrs. to Felipe Bigarny, and 75,000 mrs. to Pedro Manso.
Juan de Borgoña (painter), and Peti Juan (sculptor)	Retablo Mayor	Toledo	2,090,000 mrs.	Multiple contracts with 990,000 mrs. paid to Juan de Borgoña, and 1,100,000 mrs. to Peti Juan.

1. While the literature concerning Juan de Flandes is extensive, the most recent studies include: Chiyo Ishikawa, The Retablo de Isabel la Católica by Juan de Flandes and Michel Sittow (Turnhout: Brepols, 2004); Pilar Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes (Madrid: Caja Duero, 2006); Maryan Ainsworth, “Juan de Flandes, Chamelean Painter,” in Invention: Northern Renaissance Studies in Honor of Molly Fairies, ed. Julien Chapuis (Turnhout: Brepols, 2008), 105–21, HTTPS://DOI.ORG/10.1484/M.MEF-EB.3.826; Matthias Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes: Drei Maler aus dem Norden am Hof Isabellas der Katholischen (Kiel: Verlag Ludwig, 2011); Pilar Silva Maroto, “En torno a Juan de Flandes, pintor de corte de Isabel la Católica,” in Maestros en la sombra (Barcelona: Círculo de Lectores, 2013), 25–43; and Pilar Silva Maroto, “On Hispano-Flemish Painting in the Kingdom of Castile,” in Late Gothic Painting in the Crown of Aragon and the Hispanic Kingdoms, ed. Alberto Velesco and Francesc Fité (Leiden: Brill, 2018), 331–40.
2. For an overview of Juan de Flandes’s oeuvre under Isabel, see E. Haverkamp Begemann, “Juan de Flandes y los Reyes Católicos,” Archivo Español de Arte 25 (1952): 237–47; Elisa Bermejo Martínez, “Viajes a España de un artista flamenco y su importancia en la transición a la Edad Moderna: Juan de Flandes,” in Viajes y viajeros en la España medieval: Actas del V Curso de Cultura Medieval, celebrado en Aguilar de Campóo (Palencia) del 20 al 23 de Septiembre de 1993, ed. Miguel Angel García Guinea (Aguilar de Campóo: Fundación Sta. María la Real, Centro de Estudios del Románico, 1997), 193–212; Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 33–48; and Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 201–56. On Juan’s portraits, see Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 264–74; Carmen García-Frías Checa, “El retrato en las colecciones reales de patrimonio nacional,” in El retrato en las colecciones reales de Patrimonio Nacional: De Juan de Flandes a Antonio López, ed. Carmen García-Frías Checa and Javier Jordán de Urríes y de la Colina (Spain: Patrimonio Nacional, 2014), 98–99. The collection of forty-seven panels known collectively as the Retablo de Isabel includes images attributed to both Juan de Flandes and Michel Sittow. The work was incomplete upon Isabel’s death. The individual panels were sold to help settle the queen’s estate. As the twenty-seven surviving panels are spread through collections in seven countries across two continents, much of the scholarship on this project appears in individual catalogues. On the project as a whole, see K. Justi, “Juan de Flandes, ein niederländischer Hofmaler Isabella der Katholischen,” Jahrbuch der Königlich Preussischen Kunstsammlungen 8 (1887): 157–69; Francisco Javier Sánchez Cantón, “El retablo de la reina católica,” Archivo español de arte y arqueologia 6 (1930): 97–133; Francisco Javier Sánchez Cantón, “Addenda et corrigenda,” Archivo español de arte y arqueologia 7 (1931): 149–52; Elisa Bermejo Martínez, Juan de Flandes: Arte y artistas (Madrid: Instituto Diego Velázquez, 1962), 6–8; Ishikawa, The Retablo de Isabel la Católica, 57–64; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 167–286.
3. From shortly after arriving in Castile until 1499, Juan de Flandes was given lodging in Miraflores while creating the Retablo de San Juan Bautista (Archivo de la Cartuja de Miraflores, cuaderno 377); see Camilo María Abad Puente, “Documentos inéditos acerca de algunos cuadros flamencos sacados de la Cartuja de Miraflores,” Razón y fe 37 (1913): 87–88; Antonio Ponz, Viaje de España (Madrid: M. Aguilar, 1947), 3:9–10; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 475. Though the wording suggests that Juan primarily resided at the Carthusian chapterhouse, it is likely that he also traveled to visit the court after Isabel vacated Burgos. Juan received a payment of 30,000 mrs. on September 13, 1499, while Isabel was installed in Granada. The payment is recorded in Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 15, fols. 265ʳ; see Antonio de la Torre y del Cerro, Cuentas de Gonzalo de Baeza, tesorero de Isabel la Católica, 1492–1502 (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 1956), 2:444; Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 468; and Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 166. For Isabel’s travels that year, see Antonio Rumeu de Armas, Itinerario de los Reyes Católicos, 1474–1516 (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, Instituto Jerónimo Zurita, 1974), 251–57. Michel Sittow suggested a similar situation when describing his employment during litigation against his father-in-law in 1506. Sittow testified that on the date of his mother’s death, November 25, 1501, he was working in Toledo and that he remained there until May of the following year (Tallin Linnaarhiiv, collection 230, Aa37, I, no. 280, fol. 97); see Paul Johansen, “Meister Michel Sittow, Hofmaler der Königin Isabella von Kastilien und Bürger von Reval,” Jahrbuch der Preussichen Kunstsammlungen 61 (1940): 4; Jazeps Trizna, Michel Sittow, peintre revalais de l’école brugeoise (1468–1525/1526), Les primitifs flamands 3, Contributions à l’étude des primitifs flamands 6 (Brussels: Centre national de recherches “Primitifs flamands,” 1976), 11; and Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 43–44. During this time payments to Sittow are recorded in the account books of Seville, suggesting that the though the artists would primarily inhabit a specific local for a prolonged period of time they also maintained close contact with the itinerant court (Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduria Mayor, 1 época, leg. 153. s.f.); see Trizna, Michel Sittow, 67; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 469. As the notation references payments to both Michel Sittow and Juan de Flandes, it is likely that the painters traveled together. Juan received payments in Seville, Granada, Madrid, and Medina del Campo. Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 166.
4. Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduria mayor, 1ª epoca, leg. 15, fol. 119.2ᵛ; see Torre y del Cerro, Cuentas de Gonzalo de Baeza, 2:320; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 468. The assessment of Juan de Flandes’s career as court painter is heavily reliant upon the Isabel’s household books and the payments recorded in the cuentas, or account books, of various royal officials. These are tantalizingly incomplete documents. The cuentas are often the records of a single official and are organized by date. The entries only consistently communicate the monies paid and the recipient. The entry in the cuentas of the royal official Gonzalo de Baeza dated July 12, 1496, is typical. It reads “For another document of the queen, dated the twelfth of July from the said year, to Juan de Flandes, painter, six thousand mrs., that your Highness by her grace paid him for the payment due” (Por otra çedula de la reyna, fecha a doze de jullio desde dicho ano, a Juan de Flandes, pintor, seys mill mrs., de que su Altesa le fiso merced para ayuda de su costa). The unit of account in Spain at this time was often the maravedíes (mrs.), which was relationally defined, with 34 mrs. equivalent to one Real. The ducado, equivalent to the Venetian ducat and valued at 375 mrs., was also used. W. A. Shaw, The History of Currency 1252–1884: Being an Account of the Gold and Silver Monies and Monetary Standards of Europe and America, Together with an Examination of the Effects of Currency and Exchange Phenomenon on Commercial and National Progress and Well Being (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1895; repr., August M. Kelley, 1967), 319–44.
5. Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 35.
6. Juan’s compensation is described as a “racion” for paintings, which is to be paid at the end of the following year (Archivo General de Simancas, Casa y Sitios Reales, leg. 2, no. 1, fol. 291ᵛ); see M. R. Zarco del Valle and Agustín Arques Jover, Documentos inéditos para la Historia de las Bellas Artes en España (Madrid: Impr. de la viuda de Calero, 1870), 132–34; Antonio de la Torre y del Cerro, La casa de Isabel la Católica (Madrid: C.S.I.C., 1956), 101; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 467. The designation of an annual sum complicates the reconstruction of Juan de Flandes’s oeuvre. It is almost impossible to know when projects were initiated, the amount of guidance provided by the queen or her designee, or even the mechanisms through which the queen took possession of completed objects. Instead, the payments allotted to Juan de Flandes and Michel Sittow suggest that she maintained the artists on retainer, similar to other court artists across Europe.
7. For an overview of the many artists associated with Isabel and Fernando, see Rafael Domínguez Casas, Arte y etiqueta de los Reyes Católicos: Artistas, residencias, jardines y bosques (Madrid: Alpuerto, 1993), 120–28; and José Manuel Pita Andrade, “Pintores coetáneos de los Reyes Católicos,” in Isabel la Católica vista desde la Academia, ed. Luis Suárez Fernández (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 2005), 243–74. Michel Sittow, born in Tallinn in 1469, apprenticed in Bruges before receiving employment at the Castilian court. After Isabel’s death, Sittow served several patrons connected to the newly established Spanish-Habsburg family, including Philip the Fair, Margaret of Austria, Henry VII of England, and Christian II of Denmark. For an introduction to Sittow, his training, and his career, see Trizna, Michel Sittow; Endel Köks, “Michel Sittow: A Painter from Tallinn,” Journal of Baltic Studies 9 (1978): 32–49, HTTPS://DOI.ORG/10.1080/01629777800000041; Matthias Weniger, “Bynnen Brugge in Flandern: The Apprenticeships of Michel Sittow and Juan de Flandes,” in Memling Studies: Proceedings of the International Colloquium (Bruges, 10–12 November, 1994), ed. H. Verougstraete, R. Van Schoute, and M. Smeyers (Leuven: Peeters, 1997), 115–31; Anu Mänd, “Michel Sittow and Reval (Tallinn),” in Michel Sittow, 1469–1525: The Artist Connecting Estonia with the Southern Netherlands, ed. Tina Abel (Tallinn: As Pakett, 2001), 3–13; Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 39–164; Greta Koppel, “The Riddle of Michel Sittow’s Art,” in Michel Sittow: Estonian Painter at the Courts of Renaissance Europe, ed. John Oliver Hand and Greta Koppel (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2018), 1–8; and Matthias Weniger, “Michel Sittow: An Artist’s Career,” in Michel Sittow: Estonian Painter at the Courts of Renaissance Europe, ed. John Oliver Hand and Greta Koppel (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2018), 27–38. Francisco Chacón was the first artist employed by Isabel; see Manuel Gómez Moreno, “Francisco Chacón, pintor de la reina católica,” Archivo español de arte 3 (1927): 359–60; and José Manuel Pita Andrade, “Pinturas y pintores de Isabel la Católica,” in Isabel la Católica y el arte, ed. Gonzalo Anes y Álvarez de Castrillón and Carmen Manso Porto (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 2006), 24. Antonio Inglés arrived with the English delegation during the marriage negotiations of Catharine of Aragon to Arthur, Prince of Wales. Although he produced portraits of the Castilian royal children, he remained primarily in the service of the English crown. See Pilar Silva Maroto, “La colección de pinturas de Isabel la Católica,” in Isabel la Católica: La magnificencia de un reinado, quinto centenario de Isabel la Católica, 1504–2004, ed. Fernando Checa Cremades (Madrid: Sociedad Estatal de Conmemoraciones Culturales, 2004), 118; and Pita Andrade, “Pinturas y pintores de Isabel la Católica,” 24. Although Pedro Berruguete was never officially named a court painter, he appears among the artists working on royal projects, including the refurbishment at the Carthusian chapterhouse at Miraflores and the monastery of Santo Tomás in Avíla. Berruguete’s paintings also appear in the queen’s personal collection installed in the Capilla Real of Granada upon her death. For an overview of Berruguete, see Fernando Mariás, “Petrus Hispanus en Urbino y el bastón del Gonfaloniere: El problema Pedro Berruguete en Italia y historiografía española,” Archivo español de arte 75 (2002): 361–80, HTTPS://DOI.ORG/10.3989/AEARTE.2002.V75.I300.319; Pilar Silva Maroto, Pedro Berruguete: El primer pintor renacentista de la Corona de Castilla (Valladolid: Junta de Castilla y Léon, Consejería de Educación y Cultura, 2003); Pilar Silva Maroto, “Pedro Berruguete en Castilla,” in Actas del simposium internacinal Pedro Berruguete y su entorno, ed. Rafael Martínez González (Palencia: Diputación de Palencia, 2004), 23–48; Joaquín Yarza Luaces, Isabel la Católica: Promotora artística (Léon: Edilesa, 2005), 34–46; and Pita Andrade, “Pintores coetáneos de los Reyes Católicos,” 261–62.
8. Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 15, fol. 204ᵛ; see Torre y del Cerro, Cuentas de Gonzalo de Baeza, 2:329; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 468.
9. This is likely the earliest work created by Juan de Flandes for the queen. The panels are currently divided between the Cleveland Museum of Art, the Nardoni muzej in Belgrade, the Musée d’art et d’histoire in Geneva, the Museum Mayer van der Bergh in Antwerp, and the Abelló collection in Madrid. See Jozef de Coo and Nicole Reynaud, “Origen del retablo de San Juan Bautista atribuido a Juan de Flandes,” Archivo español de arte 52 (1979): 125–44; Catheline Périer-D’Ieteren, Anne Rinuy, Josef Vynckier, and Léopold Kockaert, “Apport des méthodes d’investigation scientifique à l’étude de deux peintures atribués à Juan de Flandes,” Genava 41 (1993): 107–18; Susan Urbach, “An Ecce Agnus Dei Attributed to Juan de Flandes: A Lost Panel from a Hypothetical Altarpiece,” Jaarboek Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten (2001): 189–207; Yarza Luaces, Isabel la Católica, 73–74; Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 135–37; and Hans Nieuwdorp, ed., Juan de Flandes en het Mirafloresretabel: Gesignaleerd en opgaspoord (Antwerp: Ludion, 2010). On Isabel’s patronage at Miraflores, see Yarza Luaces, Isabel la Católica, 49–75; and Ronda Kasl, The Making of Hispano-Flemish Style (Turnhout: Brepols, 2014), 119–72.
10. Hans Nieuwdorp, “Kroonjuweel en oorlogsbuit: Het Mirafloresretable van Juan de Flandes,” in Juan de Flandes en het Mirafloresretabel: Gesignaleerd en opgaspoord, ed. Hans Nieuwdorp (Antwerp: Ludion, 2010), 10.
11. Archivo de la Cartuja de Miraflores (Burgos), Cuaderno 377. Fundación de la Cartuja de Burgos; see Arias de Miranda, Apuntes históricos sobre la cartuja de Miraflores de Burgos (Burgos: Imprinta de Pascual Polo, 1843), 79; Abad Puente, “Documentos inéditos acerca de algunos cuadros flamencos sacados de la Cartuja de Miraflores,” 86; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 475.
12. John Oliver Hand and Martha Wolff, Early Netherlandish Painting (London: National Gallery of Art, 1986), 123.
13. Juan de Flandes received his payment for the year 1499 on May 30 from the royal secretary Francisco de Madrid (Archivo General de Simancas, Casa y Sitios Reales. Leg. 2, num. 1); see Zarco del Valle and Jover, Documentos inéditos para la Historia de las Bellas Artes en España, 132–34; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 467. On September 13 of the same year, another payment of 30,000 mrs. is recorded by Gonzalo de Baeza, due for 1498: “That you will have from the past year of 1498, the year for which I have an amount due” (que le heran devidos del año pasado de noventa e ocho año de la ración e quitación que tenia) (Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 15, fol. 265ʳ); see Torre y del Cerro, Cuentas de Gonzalo de Baeza, 2:444; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 468.
14. Archivo de la Cartuja de Miraflores (Burgos), Cuaderno 377, Fundación de la Cartuja de Burgos; see Miranda, Apuntes históricos sobre la cartuja de Miraflores de Burgos, 79; Abad Puente, “Documentos inéditos acerca de algunos cuadros flamencos sacados de la Cartuja de Miraflores,” 88; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 475.
15. “por ciertas obras que fizo para su alteza” in Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 42, fol 104; see José Maria de Azcárate, Datos histórico- artisticos de fines del siglo XV y principios del siglo XVI, Documentos para la Histora del Arte en España (Zaragoza: Caja de Ahorros de Zaragoza, 1982), 96; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 468. Regrettably, the household records for the disbursal of Juan de Flandes’s annual salary for these years are not currently known to exist.
16. The payments for 1500 are found in Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 15, fol. 282ᵛ ; see Torre y del Cerro, Cuentas de Gonzalo de Baeza, 2:479; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 468. The payment for 1501 is located in Archivo General de Simanacas, Casa y Sitios Reales. Leg. 2, num. 1; see Zarco del Valle and Jover, Documentos inéditos para la Historia de las Bellas Artes en España, 133; Torre y del Cerro, La casa de Isabel la Católica, 202; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 468. The additional 1502 payment is in Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 153, n.f.; see Trizna, Michel Sittow, 67; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 469.
17. It is important to note that actual amount of monies paid to Juan de Flandes may have even been in excess of this amount. No surviving documentation shows the discharge of the 20,000 mrs. owed for 1497, nor the 10,000 mrs. partial payment for 1501. However it is possible that the two separate payments of 30,000 mrs. in 1500, one given by Gonzalo de Baeza on April 6 and the other by Francisco de Madrid on May 15, were intended to cover this deficit, though this would have resulted in an overpayment, which could have been held against future earnings. Such a shift, though it likely affected his day-to-day liquidity, would have balanced out his annual earnings as expressed in Table 1. See Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 15 fol. 282ᵛ, and Archivo General de Simancas, Casa y Sitíos Reales, leg. 43, fol. 121ʳ. See also M. R. Zarco del Valle, Datos documentales para la historia del arte español: II, Documentos de la Catedral de Toledo (Madrid: Centro de Estudios Históricos, 1916), 132–34; Torre y del Cerro, La casa de Isabel la Católica, 101; Torre y del Cerro, Cuentas de Gonzalo de Baeza, 2:479; Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 467–68; and Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 166.
18. Archivo de la Cartuja de Miraflores (Burgos), Cuaderno 377. Fundación de la Cartuja de Burgos; see Miranda, Apuntes históricos sobre la cartuja de Miraflores de Burgos, 79; Abad Puente, “Documentos inéditos acerca de algunos cuadros flamencos sacados de la Cartuja de Miraflores,” 86; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 475.
19. Pita Andrade, “Pinturas y pintores de Isabel la Católica,” 24.
20. Achivo General de Simancas, Casa y Sitios Reales, leg. 43, 284v; see Zarco del Valle, Datos documentales, 331; Antonio de la Torre y del Cerro, “Michel Sittow, pintor de Isabel la Católica: Su estancia en España,” Hispania: Revista española de historia 71 (1958): 195; Trizna, Michel Sittow, 66; and Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 41. For dissimilarity in salaries as indicative of differences in esteem, see Joaquín Yarza Luaces, “Isabel la Católica: Promotera de las artes,” Reales Sitios 110 (1991): 60, Joaquín Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos: Paisaje artistíco de una monarquia (Madrid: Nerea, 1993), 91; Ishikawa, The Retablo de Isabel la Católica, 46; Rafael Domínguez Casas, “The Artistic Patronage of Isabel the Catholic: Medieval or Modern?,” in Queen Isabel I of Castile: Power, Patronage, Persona, ed. Barbara Weissberger (Woodbridge: Tamesis, 2008), 140; Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 165–66; and Koppel, “The Riddle of Michel Sittow’s Art,” 4.
21. “Hoy en día el Bautismo, pieza excepcional parece difícil asignarlo a Juan de Flandes, estando más próximo a Michel Sittow, el gran maestro que llega a Castilla antes que Juan de Flandes y cobrará una cantidad fija annual alta, superior a la del otro.” Yarza Luaces, Isabel La Católica, 73. Yarza Luaces hypothesizes that the project may have been initiated by Sittow and then completed by Juan de Flandes or that the central panel of the Baptism of Crist is not the original panel of the altarpiece. Either of these situations would compensate for the lack of reference to Sittow in the documents. Current opinion regarding the attribution of the altarpiece is split. See Ainsworth, “Juan de Flandes, Chameleon Painter,” 105–23, HTTPS://DOI.ORG/10.1484/M.MEF-EB.3.826; Weniger, “Michel Sittow: An Artist’s Career,” 36.
22. Jeltje Dijkstra, “Origineel en Kopie, Een onderzoeck naar da navolging van der Meester van Flémalle en Rogier van der Weyden” (PhD diss., University of Amsterdam, 1990), 82–108. The literature on the copy of the Miraflores Altarpiece is extensive, including Erwin Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting: Its Origin and Character (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1953), 1:259–64; Max Freidländer, Early Netherlandish Painting, vol. 2, Rogier van der Weyden and the Master of Flémalle (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1967), 45–46, 68; Rainald Grosshans, “Rogier van der Weyden: Der Marienaltar aus der Kartause Miraflores,” Jahrbuch der Berliner Museen 23 (1981): 49–112, ; Barbara Lane, “Rogier’s Saint John and Miraflores Altarpieces Reconsidered,” Art Bulletin 60 (1987): 655–72, HTTPS://DOI.ORG/10.1080/00043079.1978.10787614; Jeltje Dijkstra, “Origineel en Kopie,” 78–86, 95–109; Jeltje Dijkstra, “Methods for the Copying of Paintings in the Southern Netherlands in the 15th and Early 16th Centuries,” in Le dessin sous-jacent dans le peinture, ed. Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq and Roger van Schoute (Louvain: Université catholique de Louvain, 1991), 67–76; Catheline Périer- d’Ieteren, “Le retablo de la vierge de la Capilla Real de Granada et les peintres d’Isabelle de Castille,” Revue belge d’archéologie et d’histoire de l’art 67 (1998): 3–26; Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 138–43; Ainsworth, “Juan de Flandes, Chamelean Painter,” 121–23, HTTPS://DOI.ORG/10.1484/M.MEF-EB.3.826; Stephan Kemperdick and Jochen Sanders, eds. The Master of Flémalle and Rogier van der Weyden, exh. cat. (Frankfurt: Städel Museum, 2009), 319–20, cat. 30; Peter Klein, “Dendrochronological Analysis of Panel Paintings Belonging to the Master of Flémalle and Rogier van der Weyden Groups,” in The Master of Flémalle and Rogier van der Weyden, ed. Stephan Kemperdick and Jochen Sanders (Frankfurt: Städel Museum, 2009), 167; Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 70–72; Lorne Campbell, ed., Rogier van der Weyden y los reinos de la península Ibérica, exh. cat. (Madrid: Museo del Prado, 2015), 88–97, 148–52; cats. 3 and 15; Lorne Campbell, “Rogier van der Weyden y los reinos ibéricos” in Rogier van der Weyden y los reinos de la península Ibérica, ed. Lorne Campbell (Madrid: Museo del Prado, 2015), 43, 50.
23. Koppel, “The Riddle of Michel Sittow’s Art,” 4.
24. Yarza Luaces highlights the difficulty Isabel had in sponsoring artistic projects due to the high military costs of the War of Granada. Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 91.
25. Archivo General de Simancas, contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 15, fol 162ᵛ; see Torre y del Cerro, Cuentas de Gonzalo de Baeza, 2:251; Trizna, Michel Sittow, 66; and Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 41.
26. Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 41.
27. Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 15, fol 265ʳ; see Torre y del Cerro, La casa de Isabel la Católica, 445.
28. This difficulty was not limited to Sittow; Bartolomé Granaja, one of the head gardeners of the Alhambra, had to travel to Toro to claim three years of salary that he was owed. Rafael Domínguez Casas, “La corte y la imagen real” in Los Reyes Católicos y la monarquía de España: Museo del Siglo XIX, Valencia, septiembre-noviembre, de 2004, ed. Lucía Vallejo (España: Sociedad Estatal de Conmemoraciones Culturales, 2004), 93.
29. Archivo General de Simanacas, Casa y Sitios Reales, leg. 43, fol. 112ʳ; see Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 166.
30. These payments are recorded in the Archivo General de Simancas, Casa y Sitios Reales, leg. 43, fols. 135ʳ, 153ʳ, 169ʳ, 172ʳ, and 293ᵛ; see Zarco del Valle, Datos documentales, 132–34; de la Torre y del Cerro, La casa de Isabel la Católica, 101; Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 467–68; and Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 166.
31. On June 24, 1503, the royal secretary recorded payment of 20,000 mrs., with half closing out the amount due for 1502 and the remainder against the salary for that year. The balance of 20,000 mrs. was not dispersed until November 15, 1503 (Archivo General de Simanacas, Casa y Sitios Reales. Leg. 2 num. 1); see Zarco del Valle and Jover, Documentos inéditos para la Historia de las Bellas Artes en España, 133; orre y del Cerro, La casa de Isabel la Católica, 202; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 468.
32. The use of the assumption that salary correlates to modern notions of quality for attribution purposes is especially problematic, given the lack of a firmly documented oeuvre for Sittow. On the difficulty in connecting documentation to surviving works, see Weniger, “Michel Sittow: An Artist’s Career,” 29–30.
33. For example, on February 20, 1502, Fernando Ramirez in Seville records payment of 10,000 mrs. to Michael Sittow and 6,000 mrs. to Juan de Flandes (Archivo General de Simancas. Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 153); see Trizna, Michel Sittow, 67; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 469. Although Sittow received a larger sum at this time, his total monies for the year only amounted to approximately 28 percent of those given to Juan de Flandes (table 1).
34. A similar situation occurred with Michael Sittow, who in 1501 traveled to Flanders with Princess Juana. He received the largest portion of his salary from the ducal court, although he continued to receive a partial salary from Queen Isabel through 1502.
35. On average, a laborer in Castile earned approximately 22.5 mrs. per day in 1502; see Earl J. Hamilton, American Treasure and the Price Revolution in Spain, 1501–1650 (New York: Octagon Books, 1965), 394. That same year vineyard workers in Valladolid received between approximately 20 and 35 mrs. per day, depending on their specific occupation; see Bartolomé Bennassar, Valladolid au siècle d’or, une ville de Castille et sa campage au XVIe sièle (Paris: La Haye, Mouton et Cie, 1967), 295. Juan was compensated at a significantly higher rate, just over 82 mrs. on average per day due to his 30,000 mrs. annual salary in 1502. This comparison between Juan de Flandes and other Castilian workers is admittedly problematic. Although some information survives regarding the pay rates per day, we do not know how many days of work a laborer was able to secure in a year nor what other resources they would have had to capitalize. See Henry Phelps Brown and Sheila V. Hopkins, A Perspective of Wages and Prices (London: Methuen, 1981), 13. Like Juan de Flandes, Castilian workers often received compensation in the form of goods or lodging. In the first half of the sixteenth century Castilian laborers were provided with wine and bread for their midday meal (Hamilton, American Treasure and the Price Revolution in Spain, 393). Juan de Flandes’s salary is also high in comparison with others employed in the royal household. The head gardeners at the Alhambra, Bartolomé Granaje and Bernal Sebastán, were each paid 18,500 mrs. per year. Domínguez Casas, “La corte y la imagen real,” 93. The lead chaplain of Isabel’s chapel received 30,000 mrs. per year while lesser officiantes received between 7,000 mrs. and 20,000 mrs. depending on their specific position. Domínguez Casas, “La corte y la imagen real,” 94.
36. My evaluation of the overall value of Isabel’s collection of paintings is based upon the assessment of documentary evidence provided by José Manuel Pita Andrade, who created an extensive list of the paintings documented in Isabel’s collection. Pita Andrade, “Pinturas y pintores de Isabel la Católica,” 32–71. Like many other art patrons of the fifteenth century, the economic value of Isabel’s paintings, and likely her personal assesment of their cultural value, paled in comparison to the value of her tapestries and metalwork. Zalama Rodríguez, “La infructuosa venta en almoneda de las pinturas de Isabel la Católica,” 45–66.
37. Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 192. One panel was sold to Diego Fernández de Cordoba, Alcaide de los Donçeles. Francisca Enriquez de Luna, Marchioness of Denia purchased ten of the major Passion images. The largest number, thirty-two, were acquired by Philip the Fair, who immediately handed the panels over to Diego Flores, an agent of Margaret of Austria. Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 199, n.f.; published in Miquel Ángel Zalama, “Felipe I el Hermoso y las artes” in Felipe I el Hermoso: La belleza y la locura, ed. Miquel Ángel Zalama and Paul Van den Broech (Madrid: Centro de Estudios Europa Hispánica, 2006), 47n87. See also M. A. Zalama Rodriguez, “La infructuosa venta en almoneda de las pinturas de Isabel la Católica,” Boletín del Seminario de Arte y Arqueología (Arte) 74 (2008): 60–62. The size of the shipment to Flores resulted in the creation of an additional list (Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 189, 3ᵛ-4ʳ); see Ishikawa, The Retablo de Isabel la Católica, 25–27, 169; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 469–70.
38. For an analysis of the valuation and sale, see Zalama Rodriguez, “La infructuosa venta en almoneda de las pinturas de Isabel la Católica,” 45–66. A small proportion of the paintings, sixty-nine in all, were set aside for installation in the queen’s funerary chapel in Granada. Many of these objects remain in the collection of the Capilla Real of the Cathedral of Granada; see Elisa Bermejo, “Las tablas flamencas,” in El libro de la Capilla Real, ed. José Manuel Pita Andrade (Granada: Copartgraf, 1994), 177–213; Yarza Luaces, Isabel la Católica, 109–30.
39. Zalama Rodríguez, “La infructuosa venta en almoneda de las pinturas de Isabel la Católica,” 62–64.
40. Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 192; see Ishikawa, The Retablo de Isabel la Católica, 25–27; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 469–70. Unfortunately, no notation survives indicating the reasons for the varying amounts ascribed to the Retablo de Isabel panels. The surviving paintings are of comparatively equal size and of a consistent quality, though there is some variance as to modern condition due to difference in provenances. The desirability of subject matter may have been taken into consideration; though as the Christ on the Cross painting received the lowest estimate this interpretation is problematic. The average purchase price for Isabel’s total collection was calculated from the amounts published in Pita Andrade, “Pintores coetáneos de los Reyes Católicos,” 32–71.
41. Azcárate, Datos histórico-artisticos de fines del siglo XV y principios del siglo XVI, 128; Silva Maroto, “La colección de pinturas de Isabel la Católica,” n. 10; and Pita Andrade, “Pinturas y pintores de Isabel la Católica,” 57. The extremely high price garnered by the Bouts triptych was certainly due its exceptional quality in addition to the more general popular desire for Flemish-style paintings in the early sixteenth century. The triptych was not included in the sale at Toro, but instead installed in the Capilla Real in Granada.
42. This analysis of the value assessments for works alongside the documented remuneration contrasts with the findings of Zalama Rodríguez, who charted a devaluation in royal portraiture by estimating that with a median vaue of only 490 mrs., Sittow would have had to paint 102 portraits each year to justify his 50,000 mrs. salary and Juan de Flandes would have had to paint 60 portraits each year to offset his 30,000 mrs. salary. Zalama Rodríguez, “La infructuosa venta en almoneda de las pinturas de Isabel la Católica,” 53. The 490 mrs. average value for royal portraits in Isabel’s collection is approximately 50 percent of the least valuable panel and only 30 percent of the 1,635.5 mrs. average for panels from the Retablo de Isabel, indicating the significantly higher monetary value of religious images.
43. Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, num. 4, fol. 149ᵛ; see Manuel Gómez Moreno, “La capilla de la Universidad de Salamanca,” Boletín de la sociedad española de Castellana 6 (1913–14): 325; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 476. For an introduction to the artistic projects at the University of Salamanca, see Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 290–98, 362–63. On Juan de Flandes’s projects in Salamanca, see Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 296–97; Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 287–327.
44. Unfortunately, the object was dismantled before documentation or even detailed descriptions were produced. In addition to the two paintings by Juan de Flandes, two sculptural components created by Felipe Bigarny are held by the Museo de Salamanca. For an analysis of the surviving sculptural elements, see Isabel del Río de la Hoz, El escultor Felipe Bigarny (Madrid: Junta de Castilla y León, 2001), 72–75. The altarpiece is the subject of a plethora of entries in the Libros de claustros held in the Archive of the University of Salamanca. Archivo universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 4. See Gómez Moreno, “La capilla de la Universidad de Salamanca,” 321–60; Ignace Vandevivère, Catalogue de l’exposition Juan de Flandes (Bruges: Lovaina, 1985), 75–87; Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 296–97; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 475–82.
45. The true beginnings of the retablo mayor are unknown due to a gap in the university archives stretching from 1481 to 1503. The Burgundian sculptor Felipe Bigarny was approached by a representative of the university in 1503 to create fifteen sculptures for insertion into an already initiated altarpiece project; see Gómez Moreno, “La capilla de la Universidad de Salamanca,” 323. The documentary evidence does not articulate why the university officials decided to incorporate paintings, though the shift may have been due to financial considerations. Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 4 fols. 150ʳ, 150ᵛ, and 151ʳ; see Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 476–77.
46. Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 4, fols. 150ʳ -151ʳ; see Vandevivère, Juan de Flandes, 79–80; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 476–77.
47. “And that said Juan de Flandes will make the said narratives and images in the said time, very good upon sight and by determination of the masters and to the satisfaction of the university” (e q[ue]l dicho Jua[n] de flandes faga las d[ich]as ystorias e ymagenes en el dicho t[iem]po, muy buenas a v[i]sta e determynaçion de maestros e a contentamy[ent]o de la Universydad,). Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 4 fol. 150ᵛ; see Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 476.
48. Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 4 fol. 231ᵛ and 257ᵛ; see Gómez Moreno, “La capilla de la Universidad de Salamanca,” 325; and Silva Maroto, Juande Flandes, 478.
49. Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 4 fols. 265ᵛ and 267ʳ; see Vandevivère, Juan de Flandes, 80–81; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 479.
50. The work by Juan de Flandes was inspected on October 9, 1507, and on November 9 he was issued an authorization for a 15,000 mrs. payment. Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 4, fol. 287ʳ; and Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 5, fol. 7ᵛ and 9ᵛ; see Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 479. The notations regarding payment may coincide with the banco portion of the project, as the amount paid equals the amount promised in the contract.
51. “in the altarpiece on which was spent much time and many improvements” (en el Retablo que fifo gasto mucho t[iem]po e fiso mejoramy[ent]o). Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 5, fol. 99ʳ -99ᵛ; see Vandevivère, Juan de Flandes, 81; Yarza Luecas, Los Reyes Católicos, 363; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 480. Unfortunately the documentation does not specify the nature of these improvements. Because only one panel painting is currently known, it is impossible to establish the changes made to the images during their creation. Similar requests for additional compensation were made by the sculptors Gil Silóe and Diego de la Cruz, though this may due to late payments. Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 365–66.
52. Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 297.
53. On the selection of Flemish paintings over Italian Renaissance forms, see Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 296.
54. Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 5, fol. 108ʳ and 110ʳ; see Gómez Moreno, “La capilla de la Universidad de Salamanca,” 326; Vandevivère, Juan de Flandes, 86; Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 297; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 481–82. Although the Claustro de la Universidad expressed interest in having Juan de Flandes produce this retablo and drew up a preliminary contract, he did not agree to the 15,000 mrs. budget for the project.
55. The altarpiece was commissioned from the otherwise unknown local Salamancan painter Anton de Lurrena, who completed the work within one month. Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 5, fol. 115ᵛ and 116ʳ. Juan de Flandes found the painting to be excellent and done to perfection in both the figural and narrative scenes. Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 5 fols. 115ᵛ and 116ʳ; see Gómez Moreno, “La capilla de la Universidad de Salamanca,” 326; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 482. For a discussion of the relationship between Anton and Juan de Flandes, see Olga Pérez Monzón, “Producción artística en la Baja Edad Media: Originalidad y/o copia,” Anales de la Historia del Arte 22, Especial (2012): 109.
56. The retablo was originally set in a recess above a sculpted sepulcher. Due to the lack of a surviving contract, it is unclear if the Retablo de San Miguel was commissioned by Francisco in advance of his death or by his brother Diego Rodriguez de San Isidro, who was involved contracting of Juan de Flandes for the university chapel. Vandevivère, Juan de Flandes, 83–85; Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 297; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 307–19.
57. During the first decade of the sixteenth century, the choir was expanded into the nave and divided into a liturgical choir and cannon’s choir on either side of an open transcept. Antonio Cabeza, La vida en una catedral de antiguo régimen (Valladolid: Junta de Castilla y Leon, 1997), 42.
58. Caterina Limentani Virdis and Mari Pietogiovanna, Great Altarpieces: Gothic and Renaissance (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1999), 381.
59. A drawing by Felipe Bigarny bound between folios 105 and 106 of the Libro de las obras suggests the original construction. Many of the sculpted elements survive in the retablo mayor installation, suggesting the appearance of the original altarpiece. On the drawing, see Jesús San Martín Payo, “El retablo mayor de la Catedral de Palencia: nuevos datos,” Publicaciones de la Institución Tello Téllez de meneses 10 (1953): 287–91; Rio de la Hoz, El escultor Felipe Bigarny, 75–82; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 335.
60. “By the order of his lordship, it is determined that the central chapel is now the choir and therefore it is necessary that the altarpiece be increased. And therefore his lordship arranged to add to the current work the dictated narrative images and other images, as demonstrated in the sample design signed by his lordship” (por mandado de Su Señoria, se acordó de sopasar la capilla mayor a do agora es el coro y para allí es necesario que el retablo sea mas alto. Y porque Su Señoria acordo de lo añadir con la obra infrasceta que vaya por historias entrepuestas de las otras de ymagines, como está en una muestra que está firmada de Su Señoria). Archivo de la Cathedral, Palencia, Armario I, leg. 5, doc. 1: Libro de las obras, fol. 90ʳ.
61. For example, the contract specifies that the Crucifixion, Christ Carrying the Cross, and Entombment should measure six by four feet with the Crucifixion slightly larger than the others: “A narrative image of the crucifixion and another of how Jesus carries the cross on his back and another of how he is buried, each of six feet in length and four in height, except the crucifixion which will be a little wider than the others” (una historia del Crucifixo y otra de cómo lieva al Jesu la cruz a cuestas y otra de como le sepultan, de cada seis pies de largo y quarto en ancho, syno la del Crucifixo sea un xeme mas ancha que las otras). Archivo de la Cathedral, Palencia, Armario I, leg. 5, doc. 1: Libro de las obras, fol. 90ʳ.
62. “And that is made and painted by the brush of the said Juan de Flandes by his own hand . . . and that it is all done to perfection” (y que lo haga y pinte de pincel el dicho Juan de Flandesde su propia mano y no de otra . . . y que lo faga y acabe en perfeçion,). Archivo de la Catedral, Palencia, Armario I, leg. 5, doc. 1: Libro de las obras, fol. 90ʳ; see Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 492.
63. “The altarpiece in the Roman Style and images that are made for the choir of the church of Palencia” (el retablo de talla Romano y ymaginería que se faze para la capilla mayor de la iglesia de Palencia). Archivo de la Catedral, Palencia, Armario I, leg. 5, doc. 1: Libro de las obras, fol. 90ʳ. The 1504 contract notes that this style should be modeled after an altarpiece in the Colegio de Santa Cruz of Valladolid: “The altarpiece of the college of the Lord cardinal that is in the city of Valladolid, that is in the style and manner of antiquity and the Romans” (retablo del collegio del Señor cardinal que está en la villa de Valladolid, que es al modo e manera de lo antiguo e romano). Archivo de la Catedral, Palencia, Armario I, leg. 5, doc. 1: Libro de las obras, fol. 94ʳ. See San Martín Payo, “El retablo mayor de la Catedral de Palencia: Nuevos datos,” 283; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 334.
64. John F. O’Hara, “Juan Rodriguez de Fonseca: First President of the Indies (1493–1523),” Catholic Historical Review 3 (1917): 132. During his sojourn Fonseca had acquired the Triptych of the Seven Sorrows of the Virgin attributed to Jan Joest van Kalcar (ca. 1455–1519), which was installed on the trascoro altar in Palencia. The wings of the triptych are completely covered by a black ground with gold script combining a devotional prayer with an account of the provenance. Karl Justi, Miscellaneen aus drei Jahrhunderten spanischen Kunstlebens (Berlin: G. Grote, 1908), 1:329–31; Chandler Post, “A Second Retable by Jan Joest in Spain,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts 22 (1942): 127–34; Ulrike Wolff-Thomsen, Jan Joest von Kalkar, en niederländischer Maler um 1500: Schriften der Heresbach-Stiftung Kalkar (Bielefeld: Verlag für Regionalgeschichte, 1997), 43–114, 349–53; and Lioba Schollmeyer, Jan Joest: Ein Beitrag zur Kunstgeschichte des Rheinlandes um 1500, Schriften der Heresback-Stiftung Kalkar (Bielefeld: Verlag für Regionalgeschichte, 2004), 295–342. For a general overview of Fonseca’s patronage and his preference for northern European luxury goods, see Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 183–90; Joaquín Yarza Luaces, “Comercio artístico Flandes-reinos hispanos” in La pintura gótica hispanoflamenca: Bartolomé Bermejo y su época, ed. Francesc Ruiz Quesada (Barcelona: Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya, 2003), 107–17.
65. Archivo de la Catedral, Palencia, Armario I, leg. 5, doc. 1: Libro de las obras, fol. 90ʳ and 90ᵛ; see Ignace Vandevivère, La cathédrale de Palencia et l’église paroissiale de Cervera de Pisuerga (Brussels: Ministère de l’Education national et de la Culture, 1967), 66–67. Two additional scenes painted by Juan de Flandes while in Palencia, a Descent from the Cross and a Pieta were never installed into the altarpiece. The images were removed from the cathedral and are today in a private collection in Madrid; see Vandevivère, Juan de Flandes, 85. Payments were made throughout the duration of the production process and ranged from 2,500 mrs. disbursed directly to the landlord of Juan de Flandes’s house in Palencia, to larger lump-sum payments reaching a total of 50,000 mrs. with little explanation as to the reasons for this seemingly sporadic payment schedule. Armario I, leg. 5, doc. 1: Libro de las obras, fol. 90ᵛ -91ᵛ. See Vandevivère, La cathédrale de Palencia, 69–71; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 493–96.
66. Before the completion of the panels by Juan de Flandes in 1519, a third bishop, Juan de Velasco (?–1520), commissioned a large crowning assemblage including a Calvary scene from the sculptors Pedro Manso and Juan de Balmaseda. In 1529, only two years after the initial installation, the central panel by Juan de Flandes, the Crucifixion, was exchanged for a sculpted image of Saint Antolín and in 1559 the banco was replaced. The Crucifixion was acquired by the Prado museum in 2005. Between 1522 and 1525 additional panels were created, depicting the Visitation and the Adoration of the Magi, by Juan Tejerina, stylistically based on the paintings by Juan de Flandes. See Virdis and Pietogiovanna, Great Altarpieces, 381; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 342–43. Juan de Flande’s strong presence in Palencia had a dominant impact on the stylistic evolution of the region. Pilar Silva Maroto, “Notas sobre la pintura del primer tercio del XVI in Palencia,” in Actas del VIII Congreso Nacional de Historia del Arte, Cáceres (Mérida: Editora Regional de Extramadura, 1993), 323–30; Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 578–83; Pilar Silva Maroto, “Pintura y sociedad en Castilla en época de los Reyes Católicos,” in Imágenes y promotores en el arte medieval: Miscelánea en homenaje a Joaquín Yarza Luaces, ed. M. Luisa Melero (Barcelona: Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 2001), 624.
67. Judith Berg Sobré, Behind the Altar Table: The Development of the Painted Retable in Spain, 1350–1500 (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1989), 41–46. For a comparison of the Castilian retablo mayor to other Iberian altarpiece configurations, see Sobré, Behind the Altar Table, 133–55; and Justin. E. A. Kroesen, Staging the Liturgy: The Medieval Altarpiece in the Iberian Peninsula, Liturgia Condenda (Leuven: Peeters, 2009), 86–89, 95–98, 102–8, 110–128. For an overview of the remuneration of Spanish artists, see Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 364–66.
68. For an overview on the impact of different elements on Spanish retablo prices, see Sobré, Behind the Altar Table, 31–48.
69. My interpretation of Castilian altarpiece prices is based on the collection material published in Appendix 3, Table 1 of Sobré, Behind the Altar Table, 344–47.
70. Sobré, Behind the Altar Table, 49–52.
71. C. González Palencia, “La Capilla de Don Álvaro de Luna en la catedral de Toledo,” Archivo Español de Arte 5 (1929): 118–21; Sobré, Behind the Altar Table, 318–25; Joaquín Yarza Luaces, La nobleza ante el rey: Los grandes linajes castellanos y el arte en el siglo XV (Madrid: Ediciones El Viso, 2003), 134; and Kasl, The Making of Hispano-Flemish Style, 40–42.
72. Archivo de la Obra y Fábrica, Toledo Cathedral, 798 fol. 93ʳ; see Jesusa Viver-Sánchez Merino-Pérez, “Documentos sobre arte y artistas en el Archivo de Obra y Fábrica de la Catedral de Toledo: 1500–1549” (PhD diss., Universidad Complutense de Madrid, 1990), 24–25.
73. Kroesen, Staging the Liturgy, 366–72.
74. For an introduction to Isabel’s aesthetics and artistic predilections, see Yarza Luaces, “Isabel la Católica: Promotera de las artes,” 57–64; Joaquín Yarza Luaces, “Gusto y promotor en la época de los Reyes Católicos,” Ephialte. Lectureas de Historia del Arte 3 (1992): 51–70; Yarza Luaces, Isabel la Católica: Promotera de las artes,” 57–64; Domínguez Casas, Arte y etiqueta de los Reyes Católicos; Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos; Silva Maroto, “Pintura y sociedad en Castilla en época de los Reyes Católicos,” 619–31; Joaquín Yarza Luaces, “Isabel la Católica, coleccionista: ¿sensibilidad estética o devoción?,” in Arte y cultura en la época de Isabel la Católica: Ponencias presentados al III Simposio sobre el reinado de Isabel la Católica, ed. Julio Valdeón Baruque (Valladolid: Ambito Ediciones, 2003), 222–38, 243–44; Yarza Luaces, Isabel la Católica, 77–101; Jessica Weiss, “Isabel of Castile, Flemish Aesthetics, and Identity Construction in the Works of Juan de Flandes,” (PhD diss., University of Texas, 2014), 81–109. The interest in and use of northern European luxury goods to communicate an elevated social status has a long history in Spain. For connections between Isabel and the stylistic preferences of previous Castilian kings, see Yarza Luaces, Isabel la Católica, 77–83; Weiss, “Isabel of Castile, Flemish Aesthetics, and Identity Construction in the Works of Juan de Flandes,” 63–70. Ronda Kasl has traced the taste for Flemish and Hispano-Flemish funerary sculpture to nobles and merchants, especially in the environs of Burgos; Kasl, The Making of Hispano-Flemish Style, 36–89. For a more general introduction to the ways Castilian nobles used visual culture, including Flemish and Hispano-Flemish objects, to promote their own interests, see Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 221–62; José Manuel Nieto Soria, “La noblezas de Castilla” in Los Reyes Católicos y la monarquia de España: Museo del Siglo XIX, Valencia, Septiembre-Noviembra de 2004, ed. Lucía Vallejo (Valencia: Sociedad Estatal de Conmemoraciones Culturales, 2004), 153–86; and Yarza Luaces, La nobleza ante el rel.
75. Neil de Marchi and J. van Miegroet, “Exploring Markets for Netherlandish Paintings in Spain and Nueva España,” in Kunst voor de markt 1500–1700, ed. Reindert Falkenburg (Zwolle: Waanders, 2000), 81–111; Marina Belozerskaya, Rethinking the Renaissance: Burgundian Arts Across Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 160–79; Pilar Silva Maroto, “Flanders and the Kingdom of Castile,” in Age of Van Eyck: The Mediterranean World and Early Netherlandish Painting, 1430–1530, ed. Till-Holger Borchert (New York: Thames & Hudson, 2002), 142–55; Marie-Tere Alvarez, “The Art Market in Renaissance Spain: From Flanders to Castile” (PhD diss., University of Southern California, 2003); Yarza Luaces, “Comercio atístico Flandes-reinos hispanos,” 107–17; Didier Martens, Peinture flamande et gout ibérique aux XVème et XVIème siècles (Brussels: Le Livre Timperman, 2010); Kasl, The Making of Hispano-Flemish Style, 7–30; Pilar Silva Maroto, “Las relaciones artísticas entre Flandes y Castilla en el siglo XV,” in Aragón y Flandes: Un encuentro artístico (siglos XV-XVII), ed. María García Soria and María Bayón Perales (Zaragoza: Universidad Zaragoza, 2015), 67–76; Noelia García Pérez, “Gender, Representation and Power: Female Patronage of Netherlandish Art in Renaissance Spain,” in Netherlandish Art and Luxury Goods in Renaissance Spain, ed. Daan van Heesch, Robrecht Janssen, and Jan van der Stock (Turnhout: Brepols, 2018), 181–200; Didier Martens “Les primitifs flamands et leur ‘réception’ dans la peinture castillane de la fin du Moyen Âge,” in Late Gothic Painting in the Crown of Aragon and the Hispanic Kingdoms, ed. Alberto Velesco and Francesc Fité (Leiden: Brill, 2018), 264–96; Silva Maroto, “On Hispano-Flemish Painting in the Kingdom of Castile,” 297–340. Isabel’s interest in Flemish art was not limited to paintings but also included several hundred tapestries, a medium with a greater economic and cultural value. See Francisco Javier Sánchez Cantón, Libros, tapices y cuadros que coleccionó Isabel la Católica (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas, 1950), 89–150; Joaquín Yarza Luaces, “Reinas promotoras, colecciones dispersas,” in A la manera de Flandes. Tapices ricos de la Corona de España, ed. Concha Herrero Carretero, Lourdes de Luis Serra, and Joaquín Yarza Luaces (Madrid: Patrimonio Nacional, 2001), 11–32; Yarza Luaces, “Comercio artístico Flandes-reinos hispanos,” 112; C. H. Carretero, Tapices de Isabel la Católica: Origen de la colección real Española (Madrid: Patrimonial Nacional, 2004); Guy Delmarcel, “La collection de tapisseries de la reina Isabelle de Castille (1451–1504): Quelques réflexions critiques,” in El arte in la corte de los Reyes Católicos: Rutas artísticas a principios de la Edad moderna, ed. Fernando Checa and Bernardo J. García (Madrid: Fundación Carlos Amberes, 2005), 287–303.
76. Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 381–82; Silva Maroto, “Pintura y sociedad en Castilla en época de los Reyes Católicos,” 622, 629; Yarza Luaces, La nobleza ante el rey, 219–48; Ignace Vandevivere, “Berruguete versus Juan de Flandes. Pequeña nota hispanoflamenca,” in Actas symposium internacional Pedro Berruguete y su entorno, ed. Rafael Martínez González (Palencia: Diputación de Palencia, 2004), 49. Italian models, though not completely absent in fifteenth-century Iberia or even from Isabel’s personal collection of paintings, were significantly outnumbered by those from northern Europe. Yarza Luaces, “Isabel la Católica coleccionista,” 222–44; Weiss, “Isabel of Castile, Flemish Aesthetics, and Identity Construction in the Works of Juan de Flandes,” 87–89. For an interpretation of Isabel’s preference for Flemish artworks over those of quattrocento Italy, see Silva Maroto, “La colección de pinturas de Isabel la Católica,” 115–26; Domínguez Casas, “La corte y la imagen real,” 78–87; Domínguez Casas, “The Artistic Patronage of Isabel the Catholic,” 123–48. The shifts in stylistic plurality coincided with sociopolitical boundaries; the interest in Italianate forms was strongest in the Aragonese empire, especially in Valencia, which existed in a Mediterranean milieu. Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 381–85; Yarza Luaces, “Entre Flandes e Italy,” 313–28. Isabel’s aesthetic preference for Flemish art is so dominant that in 1911 Émile Betraux described the Hispano-Flemish art and architecture from this period as the “Isabelline Style.” Émile Betraux, La Renaissance en Espagne et Portugal, vol. 4–5 of Histoire de l’art depuis les premiers temps chrétiens jusqu’s nos jours (Paris: Armand Colin, 1912), 5:821–27. The use of this term, including its orientalizing connotations, has been challenged. Yarza Luaces, “Isabel la Católica, coleccionista,” 219–22; Roberto González Ramos, “The Hispano-Islamisms of Juan Guas: The Fabrication of a Historiographical Stereotype,” Mirabilia Ars 2 (2015): 104–39.
77. Isabel’s magnificence was used to support her political ambitions, both domestic and abroad. For example, sumptuous displays were used to awe ambassadors to Castile during the marriage negotiations of Isabel’s children. Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 86–114; Domínguez Casas, “La corte y la imagen real,” 75–96; Weiss, “Isabel of Castile, Flemish Aesthetics, and Identity Construction in the Works of Juan de Flandes,” 97–114.
78. The documentation in Salamanca suggests this, as it mentions a connection to former servants in Isabel’s employ. Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 298. Although it is unknown exactly how Juan de Flandes came to the attention of the bishop of Palencia, there are multiple connections to Salamanca. Juan Rodríguez de Fonseca was the nephew of Alonso de Fonseca y Ulloa (1440–1512), the archbishop of Santiago de Compostela, who was involved in projects at the church of San Benito in Salamanca. Yarza Luaces, Los Reys Católicos, 293. The sculptural components for both the altarpiece for the University of Salamanca and the Cathedral of Palencia were created primarily by Felipe Bigarny.
79. Yarza Luaces hypothesized that foreign immigrant artists were paid exceptionally well in late fifteenth-century Castile because of the quality of their work. Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 374. On the use of oil as a binder by painters in Spain, see Judith Berg Sobré, “Sobre Bartolomé Bermejo,” in La pintura gótica hispanoflamenca: Bartolomé Bermejo y su época, ed. S. Alcolea y Blanch (Barcelona: MNAC, 2003), 19–27; Enrique Parra Crego, “Los materiales de la pintura española sobre tabla del Renacimiento: El caso particular de Pedro Berruguete,” in Actas del simposium intercacional Pedro Berruguete y su entorno, ed. Rafael Martínez González (Palencia: Diputación de Palencia, 2004), 421–26; Judith Berg Sobré, “El retablo de la nieve de Bartolomé Bermejo y Martín Bernat y el retablo de Juan Lobera para el claustro del Pilar,” Goya, Revista de Arte 307–8 (2005): 215–24; and Claire Barry, “The Making of the Ciudad Real Altarpiece” in Fernando Gallego and His Workshop: The Altarpiece from Ciudad Rodrigo, Paintings from the Collection of the University of Arizona Museum of Art, ed. Amanda Dotseth, Barbara Anderson, and Mark Roglán (Dallas: Southern Methodist University, Meadows Museum, 2008), 147–245.
80. H. Pietschmann, “El problema del ‘nacionalismo’ en España en la edad moderna. La resistencia de Castilla contra el Emperador Carlos V,” Hispania 180 (1992): 83–106; I. A. A. Thompson, “Castile, Spain and the Monarchy: The Political Community from Patria Natural to Patria Nacional,” in Spain, Europe, and the Atlantic World: Essays in Honor of John H. Elliot, ed. Richard Kagan and Geoffrey Parker (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 125–59, HTTPS://DOI.ORG/10.1017/CBO9780511523397.007.
81. Jessica Weiss, “Relics of Los Reyes Católicos: The Retablo de Isabel and Spanish-Habsburg Dynastic Heirlooms,” in Imagery and Ingenuity in Early Modern Europe: Essays in Honor of Jeffery Chipps Smith ed. Catharine Ingersoll, Jessica Weiss, and Alisa McCusker (Turnhout: Brepols, 2018), 165-180.

1. While the literature concerning Juan de Flandes is extensive, the most recent studies include: Chiyo Ishikawa, The Retablo de Isabel la Católica by Juan de Flandes and Michel Sittow (Turnhout: Brepols, 2004); Pilar Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes (Madrid: Caja Duero, 2006); Maryan Ainsworth, “Juan de Flandes, Chamelean Painter,” in Invention: Northern Renaissance Studies in Honor of Molly Fairies, ed. Julien Chapuis (Turnhout: Brepols, 2008), 105–21, HTTPS://DOI.ORG/10.1484/M.MEF-EB.3.826; Matthias Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes: Drei Maler aus dem Norden am Hof Isabellas der Katholischen (Kiel: Verlag Ludwig, 2011); Pilar Silva Maroto, “En torno a Juan de Flandes, pintor de corte de Isabel la Católica,” in Maestros en la sombra (Barcelona: Círculo de Lectores, 2013), 25–43; and Pilar Silva Maroto, “On Hispano-Flemish Painting in the Kingdom of Castile,” in Late Gothic Painting in the Crown of Aragon and the Hispanic Kingdoms, ed. Alberto Velesco and Francesc Fité (Leiden: Brill, 2018), 331–40.
2. For an overview of Juan de Flandes’s oeuvre under Isabel, see E. Haverkamp Begemann, “Juan de Flandes y los Reyes Católicos,” Archivo Español de Arte 25 (1952): 237–47; Elisa Bermejo Martínez, “Viajes a España de un artista flamenco y su importancia en la transición a la Edad Moderna: Juan de Flandes,” in Viajes y viajeros en la España medieval: Actas del V Curso de Cultura Medieval, celebrado en Aguilar de Campóo (Palencia) del 20 al 23 de Septiembre de 1993, ed. Miguel Angel García Guinea (Aguilar de Campóo: Fundación Sta. María la Real, Centro de Estudios del Románico, 1997), 193–212; Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 33–48; and Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 201–56. On Juan’s portraits, see Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 264–74; Carmen García-Frías Checa, “El retrato en las colecciones reales de patrimonio nacional,” in El retrato en las colecciones reales de Patrimonio Nacional: De Juan de Flandes a Antonio López, ed. Carmen García-Frías Checa and Javier Jordán de Urríes y de la Colina (Spain: Patrimonio Nacional, 2014), 98–99. The collection of forty-seven panels known collectively as the Retablo de Isabel includes images attributed to both Juan de Flandes and Michel Sittow. The work was incomplete upon Isabel’s death. The individual panels were sold to help settle the queen’s estate. As the twenty-seven surviving panels are spread through collections in seven countries across two continents, much of the scholarship on this project appears in individual catalogues. On the project as a whole, see K. Justi, “Juan de Flandes, ein niederländischer Hofmaler Isabella der Katholischen,” Jahrbuch der Königlich Preussischen Kunstsammlungen 8 (1887): 157–69; Francisco Javier Sánchez Cantón, “El retablo de la reina católica,” Archivo español de arte y arqueologia 6 (1930): 97–133; Francisco Javier Sánchez Cantón, “Addenda et corrigenda,” Archivo español de arte y arqueologia 7 (1931): 149–52; Elisa Bermejo Martínez, Juan de Flandes: Arte y artistas (Madrid: Instituto Diego Velázquez, 1962), 6–8; Ishikawa, The Retablo de Isabel la Católica, 57–64; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 167–286.
3. From shortly after arriving in Castile until 1499, Juan de Flandes was given lodging in Miraflores while creating the Retablo de San Juan Bautista (Archivo de la Cartuja de Miraflores, cuaderno 377); see Camilo María Abad Puente, “Documentos inéditos acerca de algunos cuadros flamencos sacados de la Cartuja de Miraflores,” Razón y fe 37 (1913): 87–88; Antonio Ponz, Viaje de España (Madrid: M. Aguilar, 1947), 3:9–10; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 475. Though the wording suggests that Juan primarily resided at the Carthusian chapterhouse, it is likely that he also traveled to visit the court after Isabel vacated Burgos. Juan received a payment of 30,000 mrs. on September 13, 1499, while Isabel was installed in Granada. The payment is recorded in Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 15, fols. 265ʳ; see Antonio de la Torre y del Cerro, Cuentas de Gonzalo de Baeza, tesorero de Isabel la Católica, 1492–1502 (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 1956), 2:444; Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 468; and Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 166. For Isabel’s travels that year, see Antonio Rumeu de Armas, Itinerario de los Reyes Católicos, 1474–1516 (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, Instituto Jerónimo Zurita, 1974), 251–57. Michel Sittow suggested a similar situation when describing his employment during litigation against his father-in-law in 1506. Sittow testified that on the date of his mother’s death, November 25, 1501, he was working in Toledo and that he remained there until May of the following year (Tallin Linnaarhiiv, collection 230, Aa37, I, no. 280, fol. 97); see Paul Johansen, “Meister Michel Sittow, Hofmaler der Königin Isabella von Kastilien und Bürger von Reval,” Jahrbuch der Preussichen Kunstsammlungen 61 (1940): 4; Jazeps Trizna, Michel Sittow, peintre revalais de l’école brugeoise (1468–1525/1526), Les primitifs flamands 3, Contributions à l’étude des primitifs flamands 6 (Brussels: Centre national de recherches “Primitifs flamands,” 1976), 11; and Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 43–44. During this time payments to Sittow are recorded in the account books of Seville, suggesting that the though the artists would primarily inhabit a specific local for a prolonged period of time they also maintained close contact with the itinerant court (Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduria Mayor, 1 época, leg. 153. s.f.); see Trizna, Michel Sittow, 67; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 469. As the notation references payments to both Michel Sittow and Juan de Flandes, it is likely that the painters traveled together. Juan received payments in Seville, Granada, Madrid, and Medina del Campo. Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 166.
4. Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduria mayor, 1ª epoca, leg. 15, fol. 119.2ᵛ; see Torre y del Cerro, Cuentas de Gonzalo de Baeza, 2:320; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 468. The assessment of Juan de Flandes’s career as court painter is heavily reliant upon the Isabel’s household books and the payments recorded in the cuentas, or account books, of various royal officials. These are tantalizingly incomplete documents. The cuentas are often the records of a single official and are organized by date. The entries only consistently communicate the monies paid and the recipient. The entry in the cuentas of the royal official Gonzalo de Baeza dated July 12, 1496, is typical. It reads “For another document of the queen, dated the twelfth of July from the said year, to Juan de Flandes, painter, six thousand mrs., that your Highness by her grace paid him for the payment due” (Por otra çedula de la reyna, fecha a doze de jullio desde dicho ano, a Juan de Flandes, pintor, seys mill mrs., de que su Altesa le fiso merced para ayuda de su costa). The unit of account in Spain at this time was often the maravedíes (mrs.), which was relationally defined, with 34 mrs. equivalent to one Real. The ducado, equivalent to the Venetian ducat and valued at 375 mrs., was also used. W. A. Shaw, The History of Currency 1252–1884: Being an Account of the Gold and Silver Monies and Monetary Standards of Europe and America, Together with an Examination of the Effects of Currency and Exchange Phenomenon on Commercial and National Progress and Well Being (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1895; repr., August M. Kelley, 1967), 319–44.
5. Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 35.
6. Juan’s compensation is described as a “racion” for paintings, which is to be paid at the end of the following year (Archivo General de Simancas, Casa y Sitios Reales, leg. 2, no. 1, fol. 291ᵛ); see M. R. Zarco del Valle and Agustín Arques Jover, Documentos inéditos para la Historia de las Bellas Artes en España (Madrid: Impr. de la viuda de Calero, 1870), 132–34; Antonio de la Torre y del Cerro, La casa de Isabel la Católica (Madrid: C.S.I.C., 1956), 101; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 467. The designation of an annual sum complicates the reconstruction of Juan de Flandes’s oeuvre. It is almost impossible to know when projects were initiated, the amount of guidance provided by the queen or her designee, or even the mechanisms through which the queen took possession of completed objects. Instead, the payments allotted to Juan de Flandes and Michel Sittow suggest that she maintained the artists on retainer, similar to other court artists across Europe.
7. For an overview of the many artists associated with Isabel and Fernando, see Rafael Domínguez Casas, Arte y etiqueta de los Reyes Católicos: Artistas, residencias, jardines y bosques (Madrid: Alpuerto, 1993), 120–28; and José Manuel Pita Andrade, “Pintores coetáneos de los Reyes Católicos,” in Isabel la Católica vista desde la Academia, ed. Luis Suárez Fernández (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 2005), 243–74. Michel Sittow, born in Tallinn in 1469, apprenticed in Bruges before receiving employment at the Castilian court. After Isabel’s death, Sittow served several patrons connected to the newly established Spanish-Habsburg family, including Philip the Fair, Margaret of Austria, Henry VII of England, and Christian II of Denmark. For an introduction to Sittow, his training, and his career, see Trizna, Michel Sittow; Endel Köks, “Michel Sittow: A Painter from Tallinn,” Journal of Baltic Studies 9 (1978): 32–49, HTTPS://DOI.ORG/10.1080/01629777800000041; Matthias Weniger, “Bynnen Brugge in Flandern: The Apprenticeships of Michel Sittow and Juan de Flandes,” in Memling Studies: Proceedings of the International Colloquium (Bruges, 10–12 November, 1994), ed. H. Verougstraete, R. Van Schoute, and M. Smeyers (Leuven: Peeters, 1997), 115–31; Anu Mänd, “Michel Sittow and Reval (Tallinn),” in Michel Sittow, 1469–1525: The Artist Connecting Estonia with the Southern Netherlands, ed. Tina Abel (Tallinn: As Pakett, 2001), 3–13; Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 39–164; Greta Koppel, “The Riddle of Michel Sittow’s Art,” in Michel Sittow: Estonian Painter at the Courts of Renaissance Europe, ed. John Oliver Hand and Greta Koppel (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2018), 1–8; and Matthias Weniger, “Michel Sittow: An Artist’s Career,” in Michel Sittow: Estonian Painter at the Courts of Renaissance Europe, ed. John Oliver Hand and Greta Koppel (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2018), 27–38. Francisco Chacón was the first artist employed by Isabel; see Manuel Gómez Moreno, “Francisco Chacón, pintor de la reina católica,” Archivo español de arte 3 (1927): 359–60; and José Manuel Pita Andrade, “Pinturas y pintores de Isabel la Católica,” in Isabel la Católica y el arte, ed. Gonzalo Anes y Álvarez de Castrillón and Carmen Manso Porto (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 2006), 24. Antonio Inglés arrived with the English delegation during the marriage negotiations of Catharine of Aragon to Arthur, Prince of Wales. Although he produced portraits of the Castilian royal children, he remained primarily in the service of the English crown. See Pilar Silva Maroto, “La colección de pinturas de Isabel la Católica,” in Isabel la Católica: La magnificencia de un reinado, quinto centenario de Isabel la Católica, 1504–2004, ed. Fernando Checa Cremades (Madrid: Sociedad Estatal de Conmemoraciones Culturales, 2004), 118; and Pita Andrade, “Pinturas y pintores de Isabel la Católica,” 24. Although Pedro Berruguete was never officially named a court painter, he appears among the artists working on royal projects, including the refurbishment at the Carthusian chapterhouse at Miraflores and the monastery of Santo Tomás in Avíla. Berruguete’s paintings also appear in the queen’s personal collection installed in the Capilla Real of Granada upon her death. For an overview of Berruguete, see Fernando Mariás, “Petrus Hispanus en Urbino y el bastón del Gonfaloniere: El problema Pedro Berruguete en Italia y historiografía española,” Archivo español de arte 75 (2002): 361–80, HTTPS://DOI.ORG/10.3989/AEARTE.2002.V75.I300.319; Pilar Silva Maroto, Pedro Berruguete: El primer pintor renacentista de la Corona de Castilla (Valladolid: Junta de Castilla y Léon, Consejería de Educación y Cultura, 2003); Pilar Silva Maroto, “Pedro Berruguete en Castilla,” in Actas del simposium internacinal Pedro Berruguete y su entorno, ed. Rafael Martínez González (Palencia: Diputación de Palencia, 2004), 23–48; Joaquín Yarza Luaces, Isabel la Católica: Promotora artística (Léon: Edilesa, 2005), 34–46; and Pita Andrade, “Pintores coetáneos de los Reyes Católicos,” 261–62.
8. Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 15, fol. 204ᵛ; see Torre y del Cerro, Cuentas de Gonzalo de Baeza, 2:329; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 468.
9. This is likely the earliest work created by Juan de Flandes for the queen. The panels are currently divided between the Cleveland Museum of Art, the Nardoni muzej in Belgrade, the Musée d’art et d’histoire in Geneva, the Museum Mayer van der Bergh in Antwerp, and the Abelló collection in Madrid. See Jozef de Coo and Nicole Reynaud, “Origen del retablo de San Juan Bautista atribuido a Juan de Flandes,” Archivo español de arte 52 (1979): 125–44; Catheline Périer-D’Ieteren, Anne Rinuy, Josef Vynckier, and Léopold Kockaert, “Apport des méthodes d’investigation scientifique à l’étude de deux peintures atribués à Juan de Flandes,” Genava 41 (1993): 107–18; Susan Urbach, “An Ecce Agnus Dei Attributed to Juan de Flandes: A Lost Panel from a Hypothetical Altarpiece,” Jaarboek Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten (2001): 189–207; Yarza Luaces, Isabel la Católica, 73–74; Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 135–37; and Hans Nieuwdorp, ed., Juan de Flandes en het Mirafloresretabel: Gesignaleerd en opgaspoord (Antwerp: Ludion, 2010). On Isabel’s patronage at Miraflores, see Yarza Luaces, Isabel la Católica, 49–75; and Ronda Kasl, The Making of Hispano-Flemish Style (Turnhout: Brepols, 2014), 119–72.
10. Hans Nieuwdorp, “Kroonjuweel en oorlogsbuit: Het Mirafloresretable van Juan de Flandes,” in Juan de Flandes en het Mirafloresretabel: Gesignaleerd en opgaspoord, ed. Hans Nieuwdorp (Antwerp: Ludion, 2010), 10.
11. Archivo de la Cartuja de Miraflores (Burgos), Cuaderno 377. Fundación de la Cartuja de Burgos; see Arias de Miranda, Apuntes históricos sobre la cartuja de Miraflores de Burgos (Burgos: Imprinta de Pascual Polo, 1843), 79; Abad Puente, “Documentos inéditos acerca de algunos cuadros flamencos sacados de la Cartuja de Miraflores,” 86; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 475.
12. John Oliver Hand and Martha Wolff, Early Netherlandish Painting (London: National Gallery of Art, 1986), 123.
13. Juan de Flandes received his payment for the year 1499 on May 30 from the royal secretary Francisco de Madrid (Archivo General de Simancas, Casa y Sitios Reales. Leg. 2, num. 1); see Zarco del Valle and Jover, Documentos inéditos para la Historia de las Bellas Artes en España, 132–34; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 467. On September 13 of the same year, another payment of 30,000 mrs. is recorded by Gonzalo de Baeza, due for 1498: “That you will have from the past year of 1498, the year for which I have an amount due” (que le heran devidos del año pasado de noventa e ocho año de la ración e quitación que tenia) (Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 15, fol. 265ʳ); see Torre y del Cerro, Cuentas de Gonzalo de Baeza, 2:444; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 468.
14. Archivo de la Cartuja de Miraflores (Burgos), Cuaderno 377, Fundación de la Cartuja de Burgos; see Miranda, Apuntes históricos sobre la cartuja de Miraflores de Burgos, 79; Abad Puente, “Documentos inéditos acerca de algunos cuadros flamencos sacados de la Cartuja de Miraflores,” 88; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 475.
15. “por ciertas obras que fizo para su alteza” in Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 42, fol 104; see José Maria de Azcárate, Datos histórico- artisticos de fines del siglo XV y principios del siglo XVI, Documentos para la Histora del Arte en España (Zaragoza: Caja de Ahorros de Zaragoza, 1982), 96; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 468. Regrettably, the household records for the disbursal of Juan de Flandes’s annual salary for these years are not currently known to exist.
16. The payments for 1500 are found in Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 15, fol. 282ᵛ ; see Torre y del Cerro, Cuentas de Gonzalo de Baeza, 2:479; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 468. The payment for 1501 is located in Archivo General de Simanacas, Casa y Sitios Reales. Leg. 2, num. 1; see Zarco del Valle and Jover, Documentos inéditos para la Historia de las Bellas Artes en España, 133; Torre y del Cerro, La casa de Isabel la Católica, 202; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 468. The additional 1502 payment is in Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 153, n.f.; see Trizna, Michel Sittow, 67; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 469.
17. It is important to note that actual amount of monies paid to Juan de Flandes may have even been in excess of this amount. No surviving documentation shows the discharge of the 20,000 mrs. owed for 1497, nor the 10,000 mrs. partial payment for 1501. However it is possible that the two separate payments of 30,000 mrs. in 1500, one given by Gonzalo de Baeza on April 6 and the other by Francisco de Madrid on May 15, were intended to cover this deficit, though this would have resulted in an overpayment, which could have been held against future earnings. Such a shift, though it likely affected his day-to-day liquidity, would have balanced out his annual earnings as expressed in Table 1. See Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 15 fol. 282ᵛ, and Archivo General de Simancas, Casa y Sitíos Reales, leg. 43, fol. 121ʳ. See also M. R. Zarco del Valle, Datos documentales para la historia del arte español: II, Documentos de la Catedral de Toledo (Madrid: Centro de Estudios Históricos, 1916), 132–34; Torre y del Cerro, La casa de Isabel la Católica, 101; Torre y del Cerro, Cuentas de Gonzalo de Baeza, 2:479; Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 467–68; and Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 166.
18. Archivo de la Cartuja de Miraflores (Burgos), Cuaderno 377. Fundación de la Cartuja de Burgos; see Miranda, Apuntes históricos sobre la cartuja de Miraflores de Burgos, 79; Abad Puente, “Documentos inéditos acerca de algunos cuadros flamencos sacados de la Cartuja de Miraflores,” 86; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 475.
19. Pita Andrade, “Pinturas y pintores de Isabel la Católica,” 24.
20. Achivo General de Simancas, Casa y Sitios Reales, leg. 43, 284v; see Zarco del Valle, Datos documentales, 331; Antonio de la Torre y del Cerro, “Michel Sittow, pintor de Isabel la Católica: Su estancia en España,” Hispania: Revista española de historia 71 (1958): 195; Trizna, Michel Sittow, 66; and Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 41. For dissimilarity in salaries as indicative of differences in esteem, see Joaquín Yarza Luaces, “Isabel la Católica: Promotera de las artes,” Reales Sitios 110 (1991): 60, Joaquín Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos: Paisaje artistíco de una monarquia (Madrid: Nerea, 1993), 91; Ishikawa, The Retablo de Isabel la Católica, 46; Rafael Domínguez Casas, “The Artistic Patronage of Isabel the Catholic: Medieval or Modern?,” in Queen Isabel I of Castile: Power, Patronage, Persona, ed. Barbara Weissberger (Woodbridge: Tamesis, 2008), 140; Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 165–66; and Koppel, “The Riddle of Michel Sittow’s Art,” 4.
21. “Hoy en día el Bautismo, pieza excepcional parece difícil asignarlo a Juan de Flandes, estando más próximo a Michel Sittow, el gran maestro que llega a Castilla antes que Juan de Flandes y cobrará una cantidad fija annual alta, superior a la del otro.” Yarza Luaces, Isabel La Católica, 73. Yarza Luaces hypothesizes that the project may have been initiated by Sittow and then completed by Juan de Flandes or that the central panel of the Baptism of Crist is not the original panel of the altarpiece. Either of these situations would compensate for the lack of reference to Sittow in the documents. Current opinion regarding the attribution of the altarpiece is split. See Ainsworth, “Juan de Flandes, Chameleon Painter,” 105–23, HTTPS://DOI.ORG/10.1484/M.MEF-EB.3.826; Weniger, “Michel Sittow: An Artist’s Career,” 36.
22. Jeltje Dijkstra, “Origineel en Kopie, Een onderzoeck naar da navolging van der Meester van Flémalle en Rogier van der Weyden” (PhD diss., University of Amsterdam, 1990), 82–108. The literature on the copy of the Miraflores Altarpiece is extensive, including Erwin Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting: Its Origin and Character (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1953), 1:259–64; Max Freidländer, Early Netherlandish Painting, vol. 2, Rogier van der Weyden and the Master of Flémalle (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1967), 45–46, 68; Rainald Grosshans, “Rogier van der Weyden: Der Marienaltar aus der Kartause Miraflores,” Jahrbuch der Berliner Museen 23 (1981): 49–112, ; Barbara Lane, “Rogier’s Saint John and Miraflores Altarpieces Reconsidered,” Art Bulletin 60 (1987): 655–72, HTTPS://DOI.ORG/10.1080/00043079.1978.10787614; Jeltje Dijkstra, “Origineel en Kopie,” 78–86, 95–109; Jeltje Dijkstra, “Methods for the Copying of Paintings in the Southern Netherlands in the 15th and Early 16th Centuries,” in Le dessin sous-jacent dans le peinture, ed. Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq and Roger van Schoute (Louvain: Université catholique de Louvain, 1991), 67–76; Catheline Périer- d’Ieteren, “Le retablo de la vierge de la Capilla Real de Granada et les peintres d’Isabelle de Castille,” Revue belge d’archéologie et d’histoire de l’art 67 (1998): 3–26; Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 138–43; Ainsworth, “Juan de Flandes, Chamelean Painter,” 121–23, HTTPS://DOI.ORG/10.1484/M.MEF-EB.3.826; Stephan Kemperdick and Jochen Sanders, eds. The Master of Flémalle and Rogier van der Weyden, exh. cat. (Frankfurt: Städel Museum, 2009), 319–20, cat. 30; Peter Klein, “Dendrochronological Analysis of Panel Paintings Belonging to the Master of Flémalle and Rogier van der Weyden Groups,” in The Master of Flémalle and Rogier van der Weyden, ed. Stephan Kemperdick and Jochen Sanders (Frankfurt: Städel Museum, 2009), 167; Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 70–72; Lorne Campbell, ed., Rogier van der Weyden y los reinos de la península Ibérica, exh. cat. (Madrid: Museo del Prado, 2015), 88–97, 148–52; cats. 3 and 15; Lorne Campbell, “Rogier van der Weyden y los reinos ibéricos” in Rogier van der Weyden y los reinos de la península Ibérica, ed. Lorne Campbell (Madrid: Museo del Prado, 2015), 43, 50.
23. Koppel, “The Riddle of Michel Sittow’s Art,” 4.
24. Yarza Luaces highlights the difficulty Isabel had in sponsoring artistic projects due to the high military costs of the War of Granada. Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 91.
25. Archivo General de Simancas, contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 15, fol 162ᵛ; see Torre y del Cerro, Cuentas de Gonzalo de Baeza, 2:251; Trizna, Michel Sittow, 66; and Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 41.
26. Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 41.
27. Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 15, fol 265ʳ; see Torre y del Cerro, La casa de Isabel la Católica, 445.
28. This difficulty was not limited to Sittow; Bartolomé Granaja, one of the head gardeners of the Alhambra, had to travel to Toro to claim three years of salary that he was owed. Rafael Domínguez Casas, “La corte y la imagen real” in Los Reyes Católicos y la monarquía de España: Museo del Siglo XIX, Valencia, septiembre-noviembre, de 2004, ed. Lucía Vallejo (España: Sociedad Estatal de Conmemoraciones Culturales, 2004), 93.
29. Archivo General de Simanacas, Casa y Sitios Reales, leg. 43, fol. 112ʳ; see Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 166.
30. These payments are recorded in the Archivo General de Simancas, Casa y Sitios Reales, leg. 43, fols. 135ʳ, 153ʳ, 169ʳ, 172ʳ, and 293ᵛ; see Zarco del Valle, Datos documentales, 132–34; de la Torre y del Cerro, La casa de Isabel la Católica, 101; Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 467–68; and Weniger, Sittow, Morros, Juan de Flandes, 166.
31. On June 24, 1503, the royal secretary recorded payment of 20,000 mrs., with half closing out the amount due for 1502 and the remainder against the salary for that year. The balance of 20,000 mrs. was not dispersed until November 15, 1503 (Archivo General de Simanacas, Casa y Sitios Reales. Leg. 2 num. 1); see Zarco del Valle and Jover, Documentos inéditos para la Historia de las Bellas Artes en España, 133; orre y del Cerro, La casa de Isabel la Católica, 202; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 468.
32. The use of the assumption that salary correlates to modern notions of quality for attribution purposes is especially problematic, given the lack of a firmly documented oeuvre for Sittow. On the difficulty in connecting documentation to surviving works, see Weniger, “Michel Sittow: An Artist’s Career,” 29–30.
33. For example, on February 20, 1502, Fernando Ramirez in Seville records payment of 10,000 mrs. to Michael Sittow and 6,000 mrs. to Juan de Flandes (Archivo General de Simancas. Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 153); see Trizna, Michel Sittow, 67; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 469. Although Sittow received a larger sum at this time, his total monies for the year only amounted to approximately 28 percent of those given to Juan de Flandes (table 1).
34. A similar situation occurred with Michael Sittow, who in 1501 traveled to Flanders with Princess Juana. He received the largest portion of his salary from the ducal court, although he continued to receive a partial salary from Queen Isabel through 1502.
35. On average, a laborer in Castile earned approximately 22.5 mrs. per day in 1502; see Earl J. Hamilton, American Treasure and the Price Revolution in Spain, 1501–1650 (New York: Octagon Books, 1965), 394. That same year vineyard workers in Valladolid received between approximately 20 and 35 mrs. per day, depending on their specific occupation; see Bartolomé Bennassar, Valladolid au siècle d’or, une ville de Castille et sa campage au XVIe sièle (Paris: La Haye, Mouton et Cie, 1967), 295. Juan was compensated at a significantly higher rate, just over 82 mrs. on average per day due to his 30,000 mrs. annual salary in 1502. This comparison between Juan de Flandes and other Castilian workers is admittedly problematic. Although some information survives regarding the pay rates per day, we do not know how many days of work a laborer was able to secure in a year nor what other resources they would have had to capitalize. See Henry Phelps Brown and Sheila V. Hopkins, A Perspective of Wages and Prices (London: Methuen, 1981), 13. Like Juan de Flandes, Castilian workers often received compensation in the form of goods or lodging. In the first half of the sixteenth century Castilian laborers were provided with wine and bread for their midday meal (Hamilton, American Treasure and the Price Revolution in Spain, 393). Juan de Flandes’s salary is also high in comparison with others employed in the royal household. The head gardeners at the Alhambra, Bartolomé Granaje and Bernal Sebastán, were each paid 18,500 mrs. per year. Domínguez Casas, “La corte y la imagen real,” 93. The lead chaplain of Isabel’s chapel received 30,000 mrs. per year while lesser officiantes received between 7,000 mrs. and 20,000 mrs. depending on their specific position. Domínguez Casas, “La corte y la imagen real,” 94.
36. My evaluation of the overall value of Isabel’s collection of paintings is based upon the assessment of documentary evidence provided by José Manuel Pita Andrade, who created an extensive list of the paintings documented in Isabel’s collection. Pita Andrade, “Pinturas y pintores de Isabel la Católica,” 32–71. Like many other art patrons of the fifteenth century, the economic value of Isabel’s paintings, and likely her personal assesment of their cultural value, paled in comparison to the value of her tapestries and metalwork. Zalama Rodríguez, “La infructuosa venta en almoneda de las pinturas de Isabel la Católica,” 45–66.
37. Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 192. One panel was sold to Diego Fernández de Cordoba, Alcaide de los Donçeles. Francisca Enriquez de Luna, Marchioness of Denia purchased ten of the major Passion images. The largest number, thirty-two, were acquired by Philip the Fair, who immediately handed the panels over to Diego Flores, an agent of Margaret of Austria. Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 199, n.f.; published in Miquel Ángel Zalama, “Felipe I el Hermoso y las artes” in Felipe I el Hermoso: La belleza y la locura, ed. Miquel Ángel Zalama and Paul Van den Broech (Madrid: Centro de Estudios Europa Hispánica, 2006), 47n87. See also M. A. Zalama Rodriguez, “La infructuosa venta en almoneda de las pinturas de Isabel la Católica,” Boletín del Seminario de Arte y Arqueología (Arte) 74 (2008): 60–62. The size of the shipment to Flores resulted in the creation of an additional list (Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 189, 3ᵛ-4ʳ); see Ishikawa, The Retablo de Isabel la Católica, 25–27, 169; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 469–70.
38. For an analysis of the valuation and sale, see Zalama Rodriguez, “La infructuosa venta en almoneda de las pinturas de Isabel la Católica,” 45–66. A small proportion of the paintings, sixty-nine in all, were set aside for installation in the queen’s funerary chapel in Granada. Many of these objects remain in the collection of the Capilla Real of the Cathedral of Granada; see Elisa Bermejo, “Las tablas flamencas,” in El libro de la Capilla Real, ed. José Manuel Pita Andrade (Granada: Copartgraf, 1994), 177–213; Yarza Luaces, Isabel la Católica, 109–30.
39. Zalama Rodríguez, “La infructuosa venta en almoneda de las pinturas de Isabel la Católica,” 62–64.
40. Archivo General de Simancas, Contaduría Mayor de Cuentas, 1ª época, leg. 192; see Ishikawa, The Retablo de Isabel la Católica, 25–27; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 469–70. Unfortunately, no notation survives indicating the reasons for the varying amounts ascribed to the Retablo de Isabel panels. The surviving paintings are of comparatively equal size and of a consistent quality, though there is some variance as to modern condition due to difference in provenances. The desirability of subject matter may have been taken into consideration; though as the Christ on the Cross painting received the lowest estimate this interpretation is problematic. The average purchase price for Isabel’s total collection was calculated from the amounts published in Pita Andrade, “Pintores coetáneos de los Reyes Católicos,” 32–71.
41. Azcárate, Datos histórico-artisticos de fines del siglo XV y principios del siglo XVI, 128; Silva Maroto, “La colección de pinturas de Isabel la Católica,” n. 10; and Pita Andrade, “Pinturas y pintores de Isabel la Católica,” 57. The extremely high price garnered by the Bouts triptych was certainly due its exceptional quality in addition to the more general popular desire for Flemish-style paintings in the early sixteenth century. The triptych was not included in the sale at Toro, but instead installed in the Capilla Real in Granada.
42. This analysis of the value assessments for works alongside the documented remuneration contrasts with the findings of Zalama Rodríguez, who charted a devaluation in royal portraiture by estimating that with a median vaue of only 490 mrs., Sittow would have had to paint 102 portraits each year to justify his 50,000 mrs. salary and Juan de Flandes would have had to paint 60 portraits each year to offset his 30,000 mrs. salary. Zalama Rodríguez, “La infructuosa venta en almoneda de las pinturas de Isabel la Católica,” 53. The 490 mrs. average value for royal portraits in Isabel’s collection is approximately 50 percent of the least valuable panel and only 30 percent of the 1,635.5 mrs. average for panels from the Retablo de Isabel, indicating the significantly higher monetary value of religious images.
43. Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, num. 4, fol. 149ᵛ; see Manuel Gómez Moreno, “La capilla de la Universidad de Salamanca,” Boletín de la sociedad española de Castellana 6 (1913–14): 325; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 476. For an introduction to the artistic projects at the University of Salamanca, see Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 290–98, 362–63. On Juan de Flandes’s projects in Salamanca, see Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 296–97; Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 287–327.
44. Unfortunately, the object was dismantled before documentation or even detailed descriptions were produced. In addition to the two paintings by Juan de Flandes, two sculptural components created by Felipe Bigarny are held by the Museo de Salamanca. For an analysis of the surviving sculptural elements, see Isabel del Río de la Hoz, El escultor Felipe Bigarny (Madrid: Junta de Castilla y León, 2001), 72–75. The altarpiece is the subject of a plethora of entries in the Libros de claustros held in the Archive of the University of Salamanca. Archivo universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 4. See Gómez Moreno, “La capilla de la Universidad de Salamanca,” 321–60; Ignace Vandevivère, Catalogue de l’exposition Juan de Flandes (Bruges: Lovaina, 1985), 75–87; Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 296–97; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 475–82.
45. The true beginnings of the retablo mayor are unknown due to a gap in the university archives stretching from 1481 to 1503. The Burgundian sculptor Felipe Bigarny was approached by a representative of the university in 1503 to create fifteen sculptures for insertion into an already initiated altarpiece project; see Gómez Moreno, “La capilla de la Universidad de Salamanca,” 323. The documentary evidence does not articulate why the university officials decided to incorporate paintings, though the shift may have been due to financial considerations. Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 4 fols. 150ʳ, 150ᵛ, and 151ʳ; see Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 476–77.
46. Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 4, fols. 150ʳ -151ʳ; see Vandevivère, Juan de Flandes, 79–80; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 476–77.
47. “And that said Juan de Flandes will make the said narratives and images in the said time, very good upon sight and by determination of the masters and to the satisfaction of the university” (e q[ue]l dicho Jua[n] de flandes faga las d[ich]as ystorias e ymagenes en el dicho t[iem]po, muy buenas a v[i]sta e determynaçion de maestros e a contentamy[ent]o de la Universydad,). Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 4 fol. 150ᵛ; see Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 476.
48. Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 4 fol. 231ᵛ and 257ᵛ; see Gómez Moreno, “La capilla de la Universidad de Salamanca,” 325; and Silva Maroto, Juande Flandes, 478.
49. Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 4 fols. 265ᵛ and 267ʳ; see Vandevivère, Juan de Flandes, 80–81; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 479.
50. The work by Juan de Flandes was inspected on October 9, 1507, and on November 9 he was issued an authorization for a 15,000 mrs. payment. Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 4, fol. 287ʳ; and Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 5, fol. 7ᵛ and 9ᵛ; see Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 479. The notations regarding payment may coincide with the banco portion of the project, as the amount paid equals the amount promised in the contract.
51. “in the altarpiece on which was spent much time and many improvements” (en el Retablo que fifo gasto mucho t[iem]po e fiso mejoramy[ent]o). Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 5, fol. 99ʳ -99ᵛ; see Vandevivère, Juan de Flandes, 81; Yarza Luecas, Los Reyes Católicos, 363; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 480. Unfortunately the documentation does not specify the nature of these improvements. Because only one panel painting is currently known, it is impossible to establish the changes made to the images during their creation. Similar requests for additional compensation were made by the sculptors Gil Silóe and Diego de la Cruz, though this may due to late payments. Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 365–66.
52. Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 297.
53. On the selection of Flemish paintings over Italian Renaissance forms, see Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 296.
54. Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 5, fol. 108ʳ and 110ʳ; see Gómez Moreno, “La capilla de la Universidad de Salamanca,” 326; Vandevivère, Juan de Flandes, 86; Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 297; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 481–82. Although the Claustro de la Universidad expressed interest in having Juan de Flandes produce this retablo and drew up a preliminary contract, he did not agree to the 15,000 mrs. budget for the project.
55. The altarpiece was commissioned from the otherwise unknown local Salamancan painter Anton de Lurrena, who completed the work within one month. Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 5, fol. 115ᵛ and 116ʳ. Juan de Flandes found the painting to be excellent and done to perfection in both the figural and narrative scenes. Archivo Universitario de Salamanca, Libro de claustros, no. 5 fols. 115ᵛ and 116ʳ; see Gómez Moreno, “La capilla de la Universidad de Salamanca,” 326; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 482. For a discussion of the relationship between Anton and Juan de Flandes, see Olga Pérez Monzón, “Producción artística en la Baja Edad Media: Originalidad y/o copia,” Anales de la Historia del Arte 22, Especial (2012): 109.
56. The retablo was originally set in a recess above a sculpted sepulcher. Due to the lack of a surviving contract, it is unclear if the Retablo de San Miguel was commissioned by Francisco in advance of his death or by his brother Diego Rodriguez de San Isidro, who was involved contracting of Juan de Flandes for the university chapel. Vandevivère, Juan de Flandes, 83–85; Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 297; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 307–19.
57. During the first decade of the sixteenth century, the choir was expanded into the nave and divided into a liturgical choir and cannon’s choir on either side of an open transcept. Antonio Cabeza, La vida en una catedral de antiguo régimen (Valladolid: Junta de Castilla y Leon, 1997), 42.
58. Caterina Limentani Virdis and Mari Pietogiovanna, Great Altarpieces: Gothic and Renaissance (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1999), 381.
59. A drawing by Felipe Bigarny bound between folios 105 and 106 of the Libro de las obras suggests the original construction. Many of the sculpted elements survive in the retablo mayor installation, suggesting the appearance of the original altarpiece. On the drawing, see Jesús San Martín Payo, “El retablo mayor de la Catedral de Palencia: nuevos datos,” Publicaciones de la Institución Tello Téllez de meneses 10 (1953): 287–91; Rio de la Hoz, El escultor Felipe Bigarny, 75–82; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 335.
60. “By the order of his lordship, it is determined that the central chapel is now the choir and therefore it is necessary that the altarpiece be increased. And therefore his lordship arranged to add to the current work the dictated narrative images and other images, as demonstrated in the sample design signed by his lordship” (por mandado de Su Señoria, se acordó de sopasar la capilla mayor a do agora es el coro y para allí es necesario que el retablo sea mas alto. Y porque Su Señoria acordo de lo añadir con la obra infrasceta que vaya por historias entrepuestas de las otras de ymagines, como está en una muestra que está firmada de Su Señoria). Archivo de la Cathedral, Palencia, Armario I, leg. 5, doc. 1: Libro de las obras, fol. 90ʳ.
61. For example, the contract specifies that the Crucifixion, Christ Carrying the Cross, and Entombment should measure six by four feet with the Crucifixion slightly larger than the others: “A narrative image of the crucifixion and another of how Jesus carries the cross on his back and another of how he is buried, each of six feet in length and four in height, except the crucifixion which will be a little wider than the others” (una historia del Crucifixo y otra de cómo lieva al Jesu la cruz a cuestas y otra de como le sepultan, de cada seis pies de largo y quarto en ancho, syno la del Crucifixo sea un xeme mas ancha que las otras). Archivo de la Cathedral, Palencia, Armario I, leg. 5, doc. 1: Libro de las obras, fol. 90ʳ.
62. “And that is made and painted by the brush of the said Juan de Flandes by his own hand . . . and that it is all done to perfection” (y que lo haga y pinte de pincel el dicho Juan de Flandesde su propia mano y no de otra . . . y que lo faga y acabe en perfeçion,). Archivo de la Catedral, Palencia, Armario I, leg. 5, doc. 1: Libro de las obras, fol. 90ʳ; see Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 492.
63. “The altarpiece in the Roman Style and images that are made for the choir of the church of Palencia” (el retablo de talla Romano y ymaginería que se faze para la capilla mayor de la iglesia de Palencia). Archivo de la Catedral, Palencia, Armario I, leg. 5, doc. 1: Libro de las obras, fol. 90ʳ. The 1504 contract notes that this style should be modeled after an altarpiece in the Colegio de Santa Cruz of Valladolid: “The altarpiece of the college of the Lord cardinal that is in the city of Valladolid, that is in the style and manner of antiquity and the Romans” (retablo del collegio del Señor cardinal que está en la villa de Valladolid, que es al modo e manera de lo antiguo e romano). Archivo de la Catedral, Palencia, Armario I, leg. 5, doc. 1: Libro de las obras, fol. 94ʳ. See San Martín Payo, “El retablo mayor de la Catedral de Palencia: Nuevos datos,” 283; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 334.
64. John F. O’Hara, “Juan Rodriguez de Fonseca: First President of the Indies (1493–1523),” Catholic Historical Review 3 (1917): 132. During his sojourn Fonseca had acquired the Triptych of the Seven Sorrows of the Virgin attributed to Jan Joest van Kalcar (ca. 1455–1519), which was installed on the trascoro altar in Palencia. The wings of the triptych are completely covered by a black ground with gold script combining a devotional prayer with an account of the provenance. Karl Justi, Miscellaneen aus drei Jahrhunderten spanischen Kunstlebens (Berlin: G. Grote, 1908), 1:329–31; Chandler Post, “A Second Retable by Jan Joest in Spain,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts 22 (1942): 127–34; Ulrike Wolff-Thomsen, Jan Joest von Kalkar, en niederländischer Maler um 1500: Schriften der Heresbach-Stiftung Kalkar (Bielefeld: Verlag für Regionalgeschichte, 1997), 43–114, 349–53; and Lioba Schollmeyer, Jan Joest: Ein Beitrag zur Kunstgeschichte des Rheinlandes um 1500, Schriften der Heresback-Stiftung Kalkar (Bielefeld: Verlag für Regionalgeschichte, 2004), 295–342. For a general overview of Fonseca’s patronage and his preference for northern European luxury goods, see Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 183–90; Joaquín Yarza Luaces, “Comercio artístico Flandes-reinos hispanos” in La pintura gótica hispanoflamenca: Bartolomé Bermejo y su época, ed. Francesc Ruiz Quesada (Barcelona: Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya, 2003), 107–17.
65. Archivo de la Catedral, Palencia, Armario I, leg. 5, doc. 1: Libro de las obras, fol. 90ʳ and 90ᵛ; see Ignace Vandevivère, La cathédrale de Palencia et l’église paroissiale de Cervera de Pisuerga (Brussels: Ministère de l’Education national et de la Culture, 1967), 66–67. Two additional scenes painted by Juan de Flandes while in Palencia, a Descent from the Cross and a Pieta were never installed into the altarpiece. The images were removed from the cathedral and are today in a private collection in Madrid; see Vandevivère, Juan de Flandes, 85. Payments were made throughout the duration of the production process and ranged from 2,500 mrs. disbursed directly to the landlord of Juan de Flandes’s house in Palencia, to larger lump-sum payments reaching a total of 50,000 mrs. with little explanation as to the reasons for this seemingly sporadic payment schedule. Armario I, leg. 5, doc. 1: Libro de las obras, fol. 90ᵛ -91ᵛ. See Vandevivère, La cathédrale de Palencia, 69–71; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 493–96.
66. Before the completion of the panels by Juan de Flandes in 1519, a third bishop, Juan de Velasco (?–1520), commissioned a large crowning assemblage including a Calvary scene from the sculptors Pedro Manso and Juan de Balmaseda. In 1529, only two years after the initial installation, the central panel by Juan de Flandes, the Crucifixion, was exchanged for a sculpted image of Saint Antolín and in 1559 the banco was replaced. The Crucifixion was acquired by the Prado museum in 2005. Between 1522 and 1525 additional panels were created, depicting the Visitation and the Adoration of the Magi, by Juan Tejerina, stylistically based on the paintings by Juan de Flandes. See Virdis and Pietogiovanna, Great Altarpieces, 381; and Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 342–43. Juan de Flande’s strong presence in Palencia had a dominant impact on the stylistic evolution of the region. Pilar Silva Maroto, “Notas sobre la pintura del primer tercio del XVI in Palencia,” in Actas del VIII Congreso Nacional de Historia del Arte, Cáceres (Mérida: Editora Regional de Extramadura, 1993), 323–30; Silva Maroto, Juan de Flandes, 578–83; Pilar Silva Maroto, “Pintura y sociedad en Castilla en época de los Reyes Católicos,” in Imágenes y promotores en el arte medieval: Miscelánea en homenaje a Joaquín Yarza Luaces, ed. M. Luisa Melero (Barcelona: Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 2001), 624.
67. Judith Berg Sobré, Behind the Altar Table: The Development of the Painted Retable in Spain, 1350–1500 (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1989), 41–46. For a comparison of the Castilian retablo mayor to other Iberian altarpiece configurations, see Sobré, Behind the Altar Table, 133–55; and Justin. E. A. Kroesen, Staging the Liturgy: The Medieval Altarpiece in the Iberian Peninsula, Liturgia Condenda (Leuven: Peeters, 2009), 86–89, 95–98, 102–8, 110–128. For an overview of the remuneration of Spanish artists, see Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 364–66.
68. For an overview on the impact of different elements on Spanish retablo prices, see Sobré, Behind the Altar Table, 31–48.
69. My interpretation of Castilian altarpiece prices is based on the collection material published in Appendix 3, Table 1 of Sobré, Behind the Altar Table, 344–47.
70. Sobré, Behind the Altar Table, 49–52.
71. C. González Palencia, “La Capilla de Don Álvaro de Luna en la catedral de Toledo,” Archivo Español de Arte 5 (1929): 118–21; Sobré, Behind the Altar Table, 318–25; Joaquín Yarza Luaces, La nobleza ante el rey: Los grandes linajes castellanos y el arte en el siglo XV (Madrid: Ediciones El Viso, 2003), 134; and Kasl, The Making of Hispano-Flemish Style, 40–42.
72. Archivo de la Obra y Fábrica, Toledo Cathedral, 798 fol. 93ʳ; see Jesusa Viver-Sánchez Merino-Pérez, “Documentos sobre arte y artistas en el Archivo de Obra y Fábrica de la Catedral de Toledo: 1500–1549” (PhD diss., Universidad Complutense de Madrid, 1990), 24–25.
73. Kroesen, Staging the Liturgy, 366–72.
74. For an introduction to Isabel’s aesthetics and artistic predilections, see Yarza Luaces, “Isabel la Católica: Promotera de las artes,” 57–64; Joaquín Yarza Luaces, “Gusto y promotor en la época de los Reyes Católicos,” Ephialte. Lectureas de Historia del Arte 3 (1992): 51–70; Yarza Luaces, Isabel la Católica: Promotera de las artes,” 57–64; Domínguez Casas, Arte y etiqueta de los Reyes Católicos; Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos; Silva Maroto, “Pintura y sociedad en Castilla en época de los Reyes Católicos,” 619–31; Joaquín Yarza Luaces, “Isabel la Católica, coleccionista: ¿sensibilidad estética o devoción?,” in Arte y cultura en la época de Isabel la Católica: Ponencias presentados al III Simposio sobre el reinado de Isabel la Católica, ed. Julio Valdeón Baruque (Valladolid: Ambito Ediciones, 2003), 222–38, 243–44; Yarza Luaces, Isabel la Católica, 77–101; Jessica Weiss, “Isabel of Castile, Flemish Aesthetics, and Identity Construction in the Works of Juan de Flandes,” (PhD diss., University of Texas, 2014), 81–109. The interest in and use of northern European luxury goods to communicate an elevated social status has a long history in Spain. For connections between Isabel and the stylistic preferences of previous Castilian kings, see Yarza Luaces, Isabel la Católica, 77–83; Weiss, “Isabel of Castile, Flemish Aesthetics, and Identity Construction in the Works of Juan de Flandes,” 63–70. Ronda Kasl has traced the taste for Flemish and Hispano-Flemish funerary sculpture to nobles and merchants, especially in the environs of Burgos; Kasl, The Making of Hispano-Flemish Style, 36–89. For a more general introduction to the ways Castilian nobles used visual culture, including Flemish and Hispano-Flemish objects, to promote their own interests, see Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 221–62; José Manuel Nieto Soria, “La noblezas de Castilla” in Los Reyes Católicos y la monarquia de España: Museo del Siglo XIX, Valencia, Septiembre-Noviembra de 2004, ed. Lucía Vallejo (Valencia: Sociedad Estatal de Conmemoraciones Culturales, 2004), 153–86; and Yarza Luaces, La nobleza ante el rel.
75. Neil de Marchi and J. van Miegroet, “Exploring Markets for Netherlandish Paintings in Spain and Nueva España,” in Kunst voor de markt 1500–1700, ed. Reindert Falkenburg (Zwolle: Waanders, 2000), 81–111; Marina Belozerskaya, Rethinking the Renaissance: Burgundian Arts Across Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 160–79; Pilar Silva Maroto, “Flanders and the Kingdom of Castile,” in Age of Van Eyck: The Mediterranean World and Early Netherlandish Painting, 1430–1530, ed. Till-Holger Borchert (New York: Thames & Hudson, 2002), 142–55; Marie-Tere Alvarez, “The Art Market in Renaissance Spain: From Flanders to Castile” (PhD diss., University of Southern California, 2003); Yarza Luaces, “Comercio atístico Flandes-reinos hispanos,” 107–17; Didier Martens, Peinture flamande et gout ibérique aux XVème et XVIème siècles (Brussels: Le Livre Timperman, 2010); Kasl, The Making of Hispano-Flemish Style, 7–30; Pilar Silva Maroto, “Las relaciones artísticas entre Flandes y Castilla en el siglo XV,” in Aragón y Flandes: Un encuentro artístico (siglos XV-XVII), ed. María García Soria and María Bayón Perales (Zaragoza: Universidad Zaragoza, 2015), 67–76; Noelia García Pérez, “Gender, Representation and Power: Female Patronage of Netherlandish Art in Renaissance Spain,” in Netherlandish Art and Luxury Goods in Renaissance Spain, ed. Daan van Heesch, Robrecht Janssen, and Jan van der Stock (Turnhout: Brepols, 2018), 181–200; Didier Martens “Les primitifs flamands et leur ‘réception’ dans la peinture castillane de la fin du Moyen Âge,” in Late Gothic Painting in the Crown of Aragon and the Hispanic Kingdoms, ed. Alberto Velesco and Francesc Fité (Leiden: Brill, 2018), 264–96; Silva Maroto, “On Hispano-Flemish Painting in the Kingdom of Castile,” 297–340. Isabel’s interest in Flemish art was not limited to paintings but also included several hundred tapestries, a medium with a greater economic and cultural value. See Francisco Javier Sánchez Cantón, Libros, tapices y cuadros que coleccionó Isabel la Católica (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas, 1950), 89–150; Joaquín Yarza Luaces, “Reinas promotoras, colecciones dispersas,” in A la manera de Flandes. Tapices ricos de la Corona de España, ed. Concha Herrero Carretero, Lourdes de Luis Serra, and Joaquín Yarza Luaces (Madrid: Patrimonio Nacional, 2001), 11–32; Yarza Luaces, “Comercio artístico Flandes-reinos hispanos,” 112; C. H. Carretero, Tapices de Isabel la Católica: Origen de la colección real Española (Madrid: Patrimonial Nacional, 2004); Guy Delmarcel, “La collection de tapisseries de la reina Isabelle de Castille (1451–1504): Quelques réflexions critiques,” in El arte in la corte de los Reyes Católicos: Rutas artísticas a principios de la Edad moderna, ed. Fernando Checa and Bernardo J. García (Madrid: Fundación Carlos Amberes, 2005), 287–303.
76. Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 381–82; Silva Maroto, “Pintura y sociedad en Castilla en época de los Reyes Católicos,” 622, 629; Yarza Luaces, La nobleza ante el rey, 219–48; Ignace Vandevivere, “Berruguete versus Juan de Flandes. Pequeña nota hispanoflamenca,” in Actas symposium internacional Pedro Berruguete y su entorno, ed. Rafael Martínez González (Palencia: Diputación de Palencia, 2004), 49. Italian models, though not completely absent in fifteenth-century Iberia or even from Isabel’s personal collection of paintings, were significantly outnumbered by those from northern Europe. Yarza Luaces, “Isabel la Católica coleccionista,” 222–44; Weiss, “Isabel of Castile, Flemish Aesthetics, and Identity Construction in the Works of Juan de Flandes,” 87–89. For an interpretation of Isabel’s preference for Flemish artworks over those of quattrocento Italy, see Silva Maroto, “La colección de pinturas de Isabel la Católica,” 115–26; Domínguez Casas, “La corte y la imagen real,” 78–87; Domínguez Casas, “The Artistic Patronage of Isabel the Catholic,” 123–48. The shifts in stylistic plurality coincided with sociopolitical boundaries; the interest in Italianate forms was strongest in the Aragonese empire, especially in Valencia, which existed in a Mediterranean milieu. Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 381–85; Yarza Luaces, “Entre Flandes e Italy,” 313–28. Isabel’s aesthetic preference for Flemish art is so dominant that in 1911 Émile Betraux described the Hispano-Flemish art and architecture from this period as the “Isabelline Style.” Émile Betraux, La Renaissance en Espagne et Portugal, vol. 4–5 of Histoire de l’art depuis les premiers temps chrétiens jusqu’s nos jours (Paris: Armand Colin, 1912), 5:821–27. The use of this term, including its orientalizing connotations, has been challenged. Yarza Luaces, “Isabel la Católica, coleccionista,” 219–22; Roberto González Ramos, “The Hispano-Islamisms of Juan Guas: The Fabrication of a Historiographical Stereotype,” Mirabilia Ars 2 (2015): 104–39.
77. Isabel’s magnificence was used to support her political ambitions, both domestic and abroad. For example, sumptuous displays were used to awe ambassadors to Castile during the marriage negotiations of Isabel’s children. Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 86–114; Domínguez Casas, “La corte y la imagen real,” 75–96; Weiss, “Isabel of Castile, Flemish Aesthetics, and Identity Construction in the Works of Juan de Flandes,” 97–114.
78. The documentation in Salamanca suggests this, as it mentions a connection to former servants in Isabel’s employ. Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 298. Although it is unknown exactly how Juan de Flandes came to the attention of the bishop of Palencia, there are multiple connections to Salamanca. Juan Rodríguez de Fonseca was the nephew of Alonso de Fonseca y Ulloa (1440–1512), the archbishop of Santiago de Compostela, who was involved in projects at the church of San Benito in Salamanca. Yarza Luaces, Los Reys Católicos, 293. The sculptural components for both the altarpiece for the University of Salamanca and the Cathedral of Palencia were created primarily by Felipe Bigarny.
79. Yarza Luaces hypothesized that foreign immigrant artists were paid exceptionally well in late fifteenth-century Castile because of the quality of their work. Yarza Luaces, Los Reyes Católicos, 374. On the use of oil as a binder by painters in Spain, see Judith Berg Sobré, “Sobre Bartolomé Bermejo,” in La pintura gótica hispanoflamenca: Bartolomé Bermejo y su época, ed. S. Alcolea y Blanch (Barcelona: MNAC, 2003), 19–27; Enrique Parra Crego, “Los materiales de la pintura española sobre tabla del Renacimiento: El caso particular de Pedro Berruguete,” in Actas del simposium intercacional Pedro Berruguete y su entorno, ed. Rafael Martínez González (Palencia: Diputación de Palencia, 2004), 421–26; Judith Berg Sobré, “El retablo de la nieve de Bartolomé Bermejo y Martín Bernat y el retablo de Juan Lobera para el claustro del Pilar,” Goya, Revista de Arte 307–8 (2005): 215–24; and Claire Barry, “The Making of the Ciudad Real Altarpiece” in Fernando Gallego and His Workshop: The Altarpiece from Ciudad Rodrigo, Paintings from the Collection of the University of Arizona Museum of Art, ed. Amanda Dotseth, Barbara Anderson, and Mark Roglán (Dallas: Southern Methodist University, Meadows Museum, 2008), 147–245.
80. H. Pietschmann, “El problema del ‘nacionalismo’ en España en la edad moderna. La resistencia de Castilla contra el Emperador Carlos V,” Hispania 180 (1992): 83–106; I. A. A. Thompson, “Castile, Spain and the Monarchy: The Political Community from Patria Natural to Patria Nacional,” in Spain, Europe, and the Atlantic World: Essays in Honor of John H. Elliot, ed. Richard Kagan and Geoffrey Parker (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 125–59, HTTPS://DOI.ORG/10.1017/CBO9780511523397.007.
81. Jessica Weiss, “Relics of Los Reyes Católicos: The Retablo de Isabel and Spanish-Habsburg Dynastic Heirlooms,” in Imagery and Ingenuity in Early Modern Europe: Essays in Honor of Jeffery Chipps Smith ed. Catharine Ingersoll, Jessica Weiss, and Alisa McCusker (Turnhout: Brepols, 2018), 165-180.

Imprint

Author: Jessica Weiss

Publication Date: Winter 2019

Review: Peer Review (Double Blind)

Recommended Citation:
Jessica Weiss, "Juan de Flandes and His Financial Success in Castile," Journal of Historians of Netherlandish Art 11:1 (Winter 2019) DOI: 10.5092/jhna.2019.11.1.2

Juan de Flandes, Pintor de Corte

The Financial Evaluation of Works Produced for Isabel

Juan de Flandes and the Altarpiece Market

Understanding Juan de Flandes’s Financial Success

Acknowledgements

List of Illustrations

Footnotes

Bibliography

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